Virtually everyone knows that it’s hard to square the differences between the Genesis account of creation and what we now know through science. For centuries, people believed that the earth was less than 10,000 years old, because the Bible doesn’t seem to go back any further than that. Now, geology, biology, chemistry, anthropology, archaeology, and astronomy agree that the earth (and our universe) is far, far older than that. Now, it’s certainly possible that God spoke everything into existence 10,000 years ago, but with the appearance that it had been here for billions of years. That’s what I believed when I was a Christian. Others think that the “6 days” spoken of in Genesis is figurative for simply “periods of time.” But even if one of those theories could answer some of the problems, it can’t solve them all.
The average person living at the time Genesis was written did not know that the earth is a sphere, or that the sun is a star, or that the earth is just one of at least 8 planets circling the sun. Of course, if God miraculously inspired the writing of Genesis, then it doesn’t matter what people understood at the time it was written, because God knew everything we know now, and more. But that’s the thing: Genesis has more problems than just the age of the universe. When you read Genesis carefully, you get a view of the universe much like the one depicted by these images:
Let’s look at some passages, and I think you’ll see the similarities. Take Genesis 1:6,7, for instance:
And God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” And God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. And it was so.
What? This is probably one of the most confusing passages in this chapter if you’re trying to apply it to what we know of the cosmos. What does it mean to separate the waters from the waters? And what’s this “expanse” that it talks about? Well, verse 8 answers that for us:
And God called the expanse Heaven.
In other words, the expanse is the sky. It’s not “Heaven” in the spiritual sense, as we’ll see from some of the other verses. But how does the sky separate waters? We learn more starting with verse 9:
And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.
So the waters under the expanse (sky) are oceans, rivers, etc. What are the waters above the sky? We can’t say it’s water vapor for two reasons: One, it doesn’t make sense in the context of the passage. But the second and more important reason is explained here (vs 14-18):
And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.
According to this passage, the sun, moon, and stars are stuck in the sky — the same sky that keeps back the “waters above.”
Now look again at the two images I posted above. Genesis is describing a system in which the sky acts as a dome around the earth. This dome has pretty lights stuck in it to help us see, even when it’s night. The business about water being above the sky makes sense when you think about it — why else is the sky blue? And where do you think rain comes from? We see this in Genesis 7:11-12, when God decides to flood the earth:
In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. And rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
For people living at the time Genesis was written, this was not a bad job of explaining things. It explained why the sky was blue, where rain came from, and why we have the sun, moon, and stars. We can easily understand why they held these beliefs. However, in today’s age, the Genesis account is absurd. Efforts to make it fit with what we now know about the universe is a bit like trying to rationally argue for the existence of Santa Claus. Why not just put an end to all the mental gymnastics and accept that like every other religious text in the world, the Bible is just the product of mankind’s imagination? It may be a difficult proposition to accept, if you’re a firm believer. But I can tell you from experience that the whole thing makes a lot more sense when you stop assuming God had anything to do with the Bible.
Finding Truth 
Laurie, Thanks for the clarification. I held similar beliefs about the Law of Moses for many years. I have since changed my perspective and now believe that the Law is fulfilled in Jesus Christ and His life and actions.
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Interesting, isn’t it Marc, that 90% of all scientists are atheists, but 90% of all those incarcerated are theists? There’s a whole lot of “unreasonable” scientists running around out there —
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Arch, After the Disney movies, did you get one of the naughty movies out of the red box and decide to have another Coke?
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The “Law of Moses” was plagiarized, as was much else in the OT, from the last great Amurrite king, Hamurrabi, the Lawgiver – I fail to see how the laws of a Mesopotamian king could possibly be fulfilled by an Early Iron Age Jewish Rabbi.
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C’mon Marc, quit projecting your own subliminal fantasies —
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C,mon Arch, quit projecting you own subliminal fantasies. Not only are the vast majority of convicts theist, so is the general population. The atheistic scientists who remain primarily in academia are a very small segment of society and are known for their inflated intellects and egos. The thought of a higher power and intellect so disturbs their egos, they are mostly atheists.
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How those who share your beliefs remain out of straight-jackets has always been a mystery to me.
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The 90 plus percent of us who share a belief in a higher power remain out of straight-jackets and concentration camps, as long the atheist like you do not control the government. But the prospects of a tyranny worse than the atheistic Communists and Nazis remain a real possibility until the Lord returns and sends His enemies to annihilation in the Lake of Fire.
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Hey Marc – wow I leave for a few hours and I missed quite a bit. 🙂
It is clear from the wording that the sun was created on the fourth day and placed in the firmament on that day. If it was the sun that was created on the first day then that is what would have been written – they would have wrote what verse 16 said in verse 3. But that isn’t what it says. It says the light was created on the first day. I don’t know exactly what the ancients thought but it is clear from the plain reading that they believed the sun was created on the fourth day and that a more general light source was created on the first. In a lot of ways this would kind of make sense to an ancient mind that didn’t know as we do that it is the sun itself that causes the sky to go from dark to bright blue. After all, they thought that there were a whole lot more “lights” in the sky during the night (stars and moon) and that didn’t seem to make the sky light blue, so why would they think that only one light (sun) would make it light blue. It would have been natural for them to think that God created some overarching light source to make the sky light blue during the day.
Either way my conjecture about how the ancients saw things is not the important point – it is clearly stated that the sun is created and placed in the firmament on the fourth day and not on the first.
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Arch, I really think you stepped over the line in your last comment. My father served in combat in the USN in WWII against the Nazis and Japanese, I served in USAF during the Cold War against the Warsaw Pact Communists, and my son served in combat in the US Army against the Islamic terrorists who would lob off your melon in a minute. Freedom of speech is not free, so please show more respect.
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Howie, if you’ve read the post I did about the “lake of fire,” you should realize that nothing you say can possibly have any effect on someone with that degree of mental disorder – don’t waste your time trying to apply logic, that’s a foreign concept in the la-la land in which he lives.
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Howie, The ancients probably did not give much thought to these issues because they understood the main thrust of the revelation of Genesis was to affirm God as the source of Creation, and reveal his plans for His Creation. Because the revelation of Genesis was not meant to be limited to the ancients, it has a timeless quality that makes it as relevant today as thousands of years ago. Many wish to discredit this revelation through the revelation of science, yet science affirms the revelation if we allow it to do so.
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Which comment is that, Marc? If you’re referring to my two quotations of Hitler’s, that indicated that he was in fact NOT an atheist, as you asserted, but rather a very religious person, who many historians maintain, felt he was doing the “Lord’s work,” by exterminating the Jews he believed had killed Christ.
What has that to do with whether or not Hitler was a theist, like yourself?
Again, SO? I was in Viet Nam, which places me somewhere between you and your son, but what has that to do with anything? Which Islamic terrorists, the ones in Afghanistan, or the ones the US Christian terrorists drew into Iraq by illegally bombing it on the pretense of destroying WMD’s?
In fact, I don’t even see the two Hitler quotations – while I was posting them, we had an intense electrical storm here and I lost I’net connection just as I hit “POST COMMENT,” so I don’t even see that they ever posted.
Other than that, I have no idea what you may be talking about, where you think I “stepped over the line” – possibly you could remind me.
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Howie, if you’ve read the post I did about the “lake of fire,” you should realize that nothing you say can possibly have any effect on someone with that degree of mental disorder
I don’t think anyone posting here has a mental disorder. We all seem pretty stubborn in what we believe (who isn’t) so it appears we are all “locked” into what we believe, but I know that very few people really are so incredibly locked that they don’t at least adjust some of what they believe (including myself) due to reasoning. Sometimes the short amount of reasoning in blog comments just isn’t enough to push us to change.
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Arch, If you think that those that don’t agree with you belong in a straight jacket, then you have no respect for freedom of speech and you are out of line.
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Can’t we all just get along? 😉
Thank you both for your service!
Marc, have you ever considered the fact that Yeshua said the false apostle was in Ephesus and that he taught it was okay to eat meat sacrificed to idols, which Paul did in 1 corinthians 8? Yeshua said if you want eternal life keep the law. Did Paul really have the authority to change that? You can’t serve two masters.
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THAT was it? What was all of that business about all of the wars your family have fought in? First of all, I didn’t suggest a muzzle, even those in straight jackets have the freedom of speech. I just marveled that you had been able to avoid one. Lakes of fire?
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Didn’t Pete have a
hallucinationvision that said it was OK to eat anything?LikeLike
Labeling those whom you do not agree with as mentally ill and suggesting that they need constraint is right out of the Communist play book.
Actually the Lake of Fire is the love of God experienced by those who hate him. They would rather be dead for all eternity and God grants them their wish.
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Nope! Read it again Arch. My phone is dying, so I’ll help you tomorrow, if you don’t figure it out by then. Goodnight Mensa! Goodnight Marc!
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Laurie,
I think the issue you raise is a matter of authority. If you do not believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and fulfills the provisions of the Mosaic Covenant, then you would not accept His Church as the pillar and ground of the truth.
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Quit while you’re behind, Marc, you’re only proving my point.
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I assure you Laurie, that between now and then, I’ll not give it a second thought, or even a first one, for that matter —
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I’m getting scars on my tongue —
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This is where the fundamentalist wheels fall off, but they never seem to notice that the donkey cart has stopped moving.
The Mosaic Covenant is a fabrication as is the person who it is based upon.
The real problem with arguing with such intransigent people is even though it has been shown to be nonsense the Evangelist will still tell you that belief in the veracity of the Old Testament is not crucial to faith in the man-god Jesus.
So, one could offer all the historical and archaeological evidence one likes, these people are so stuck in a groove the clearer the truth becomes the more obfuscated their view of reality.
William Lane Craig was once asked what he would do if it was proved that his god did not exist, he responded by saying he would pray to god for guidance.
While science has pretty much all the evidence it needs to completely debunk the Old Testament
Fundamental Christians ( and lets remember their Muslim and Jewish counterparts)
have been indoctrinated by their teachers and preachers to counter any and all arguments.
They have even developed their own version of “science” ID/Creationism.
Ask Nate.
There is a mental blind spot that is so ingrained, so enmeshed in their psyche that merely contemplating that the bible is in some way wrong, or false is anathema and so their brains merely
shut down and they assume that anyone or anything that falls outside of this dogma is in some fashion motivated by the Devil.
There is really only one way a Fundamentalist will ever embrace normality and this is if something about what he has been inured against strikes an inner chord that causes him/her to back up and think : ”Wait a moment….”
Many Jewish Rabbis are beginning to openly acknowledge that the biblical history of the Jewish people is pure myth.
Once they are confident enough to present a united front , firstly against their more orthodox brethren, without fear of serious recrimination and the effects to the state of Israel, perhaps their message will eventually be disseminated throughout the rest of the Abrahamic world.
When the Torah is acknowledged by the Jews to be a fictitious narrative – and based on what’s happened so far it looks promising – then normal Christianity is going to have to face some pretty tough questions, Questions the bible will no longer be able to provide answers to.
And then the real unravelling of christianity will begin.
And thank the gods for that…
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