YEC's Silence on Anthropology

The Grand Canyon at dawn.

Dr. Alice C. Linsley

Young-earth creationists believe that the days of Genesis 1 were six consecutive 24-hour days, which occurred 6,000–12,000 years ago. They believe that about 4,300 years ago the surface of the earth was radically rearranged by a worldwide flood. Some sea creatures, and all land animals and birds not in Noah’s Ark perished and were subsequently buried in the flood sediments. Therefore, young-earth creationists believe that the catastrophic global flood was responsible for most of the rock layers and fossils. They believe that some rock layers and some fossils were deposited before the Flood and other layers and fossils were produced in localized sedimentation events or processes.

Geologists agree that the age of the rock layers that make up the walls of the Grand Canyon range between 270 million years and 1.8 billion years. YEC argues that the Grand Canyon was created with the appearance of age. This begs the question: "Why would God create a deception?"

Notice that YEC focuses on geology. The YEC literature avoids anthropological data, such as the fact that humans were burying their dead in red ocher for at least 100,000 years as a symbolic blood covering in the hope of life after death. (See "On Blood and the Impulse to Immortality" for further explanation.) It fails to address the substantial evidence of artifacts which reveal that humans had already populated most of the globe by 14,000 years ago, around 10,000 years before Noah lived.

The YEC explanation for the extinction of creatures is a worldwide flood. They believe that more than 50% of all the types of land vertebrate animals that God created have been lost to extinction. This is pure speculation intended to address a weakness in the YEC teachings. But notice again, that YEC avoids discussion of the very ancient human fossils around the world that show no evidence of violent deaths such as drowning or being battered by raging waves and winds. 

Consider the Gobero cemetery finds. Paleoanthropologist Paul Sereno unearthed 10,000-year skeletons at Gobero in Niger. These were buried on the edge of a paleolake on the northwestern rim of the Chad Basin. The Gobero site is the earliest known cemetery in the Sahara and the skeletons found there indicated that some were at least 6 feet tall. Sereno reports that most of the humans buried there appear to have died of natural causes.

What was happening before Noah?

The evidence of archaic human industry, religion, ritual burial, and domesticity in Africa, Arabia, and China creates a more accurate picture of the earlier populations.

On the Arabian Peninsula, the Qafzeh population was using tools 125,000 years ago at Jebel Faya and burying their dead in red ochre.

Humans were making reed mattresses 77,000 years ago in South Africa. That is where the oldest mattress— made from compacted grasses and leafy plants— was found at the Sibudu Cave site in KwaZulu-Natal. In this same region a stone carving of a python has been found that dates to 70,000 years.

There is the evidence of mining 80,000 to 90,000 years ago. These major mining operations in southern Africa included quarries and tunnels. It is estimated that a million kilos of red ocher ore were excavated from several mines. At one mine half a million stone-digging tools were found. The red ocher was ground to power and was used globally to bury rulers. Anthropologists agree that the red ocher symbolized blood.

The Pengtoushan culture thrived along the Yangtze River between BC. 7500–6100, and the Yangshao culture flourished along the central Yellow River between BC. 5000 and 3000. Yangshao nobles wore silk garments.

The YEC literature largely avoids examination of the artifact evidence of human existence on earth. It also ignores the genomic evidence of human ancestry as early as 250,000 years before the present (YBP). 

The dispersion of Abraham's early ancestors out of Africa is never discussed. (Nimrod the Kushite was one of them). In fact, Africa rarely enters YEC literature because Noah is cast as a Middle Easterner whose ship landed on a mountain in Turkey. And YEC folks mistakenly assume that Africa is the home of black people, and they are under divine judgement. The modern assumption that African = black is false. (See this discussion.)

This last fact reveals the unbiblical and racist nature of YEC dogma. At the back of YEC books such as Terry Mortenson's Coming to Grips with Genesis, one finds the Twelve Affirmations and Denials. Affirmation XII claims that the diversity of languages and skin color came about as a result of divine judgment at the Tower of Babel.

XII. We affirm that all people living and dead are descended from Adam and Eve...and that the various people groups (with their various languages, cultures, and distinctive physical characteristics, including skin color) arose as a result of God's supernatural judgment at the Tower of Babel..."

There is no denying that the oldest human fossils have been found in Africa. Not surprisingly, the oldest material in Genesis connects to early Hebrew populations living in Africa. The oldest known site of Horite Hebrew worship was at Nekhen on the Nile. This was a settlement in Noah's time (c. 4000 BC). The oldest preserved beard (c.3400 BC) was found there in burial no. 79, and it is the beard of a redhead. 

The themes of Genesis 1-3 find their closest parallels in African creation and origin stories. So much so, that it can be argued that the Gospel has roots in Africa.

Noah was a Neolithic Proto-Saharan ruler.

It hardly matters if the days of creation were 24-hour days or thousands of years each. The earth's creation predates the time of Noah by millions of years. Noah lived during the African Aqualithic, when the Sahara was wet. Noah was a Proto-Saharan ruler who lived about 6000 years ago in the region of Lake Chad. This is the only location on earth that is claimed to be Noah's homeland by the native populations. The place names of that region tell us so: Borno and Benue mean "Land of Noah" in different dialects. The Kanuri speak of Lake Chad as Buhar Nuhu, meaning "Sea of Noah."

Young Earth Creationism either ignores the human artifacts that are many thousands, even millions of years old, or it attempts to discredit the dating by saying that carbon dating is inaccurate. Of course, scientists use many dating methods. When you are talking about artifacts that are 500,000-800,000 years, even if the dating is off by 50%, the ages are still well beyond the YEC estimate of the Earth's age at 10,000 years. Many thousands of human artifacts have been found that date to over 200,000 years. See this list of some of the more significant finds.

Biblical anthropology is a relatively new science, but it helps us to see the parallels between the Genesis origin stories and similar African narratives. The parallels include speaking of the High God as Father who has a Son; estrangement from the Creator because of the disobedience of the first parents, and the belief that diversity of human appearance is due to the soil from which the first parents were formed. Thus, Adam is described as a red man being formed from the red earth of the Nile Valley. The autochthonous origin of humans is found in many African narratives. It is expressed in the Shilluk creation story. The Shilluk of Sudan call the Creator Jouk. Jouk made white people out of white sand and the Shilluk out of black soil. When the Creator came to Egypt, he made the people there out of the red silt of the Nile. 

The great challenge is to help people read Genesis more empirically so they avoid dismissal of the truth of the myths and avoid a literal reading where it is not intended. (See Between Biblical Literalism and Biblical Illiteracy.)

Related reading: The Roots of the Gospel are in Africa; Artifacts of Great Antiquity; YEC and Biodiversity Loss; YEC Dogma is NOT Biblical; Was Earth Repopulated after Noah's Flood?; Time to Jettison Young Earth Creationism

Is Scientific Dating Reliable?

This faux amphibolite formation, found at Nuvvuagittuq greenstone belt in northern Quebec, 
may be  a portion of Earth's primordial crust. It dates to 4.28 billion years ago.
Credit: Don Francis

Alice C. Linsley

I am often asked if carbon 14 dating of fossils is reliable. People who make a habit of distrusting science point to this one method and claim that it is flawed. They seem unaware that there are many methods by which to date rocks, fossils and artifacts, and that carbon dating techniques are continuously refined. I recommend watching this video.

Even if C14 dating is wrong by 50%, we still have thousands of human artifacts that are 20 to 50 thousand years old. How can this be if the Earth is only 6000 years old? Obviously, the young earth theory has many flaws, not the least of which is the perpetuation of the idea that the Genesis creation accounts must be taken literally and Ussher's calculations using the Genesis King Lists can be used to establish the age of the earth.

Carbon 14

Fossils and rocks are dated by chemical means that rely on carbon dating which has a variance due to climate changes. Radiocarbon is continuously produced in the upper atmosphere at fairly constant levels. The radiocarbon from the atmosphere is incorporated into all living organisms on earth. Once the organisms die, the radioactive isotope decays at a known rate, so by measuring the radiocarbon levels remaining in samples scientists can work out how old things are. In the past this was done by burning a small sample of the object. Today there is a better method involving plasma oxidation chambers used to oxidize the object’s surface. This slower method does less damage to the artifact.

When molten rock cools radioactive atoms are trapped inside the igneous rock. Afterwards, the atoms decay at a predictable rate. By measuring the quantity of unstable atoms left in a rock and comparing it to the quantity of stable daughter atoms in the rock, scientists can estimate the amount of time that has passed since that rock formed.

Tree rings are also helpful in dating, but the atmospheric carbon from tree rings only goes back to about 13,000 years. That is why scientists were very excited about the sedimentary cores extracted from Lake Suigetsu in Japan. These cores extend back to 52,800- 60,000 years ago. Dating of climate changes is tracked through terrestrial core samples and also the Greenland ice cores.

With carbon dating scientists provide as accurate a range as possible. Something might be dated between 8,000 and 12,000 years old, for example. The range is because the initial amounts of radiocarbon in the environment incorporated into growing organisms vary slightly from year to year and between different parts of the carbon cycle worldwide.

Other Dating Methods

Besides radiometric dating, scientists have techniques for analyzing the breakdown of amino acids. Amino acid dating is used to estimate the age of a specimen in paleobiology, molecular paleontology, archaeology, forensic science, taphonomy, sedimentary geology and other fields. This technique relates changes in amino acid molecules to the time elapsed since they were formed.

All biological tissues contain amino acids. All amino acids except glycine are optically active, having a stereocenter at their α-C atom. This means that the amino acid can have two different configurations, "D" or "L" which are mirror images of each other. With a few important exceptions, living organisms keep all their amino acids in the "L" configuration. When an organism dies, control over the configuration of the amino acids ceases, and the ratio of D to L moves from a value near 0 towards an equilibrium value near 1, a process called racemization. Thus, measuring the ratio of D to L in a sample enables one to estimate how long ago the specimen died. The Amino Acid Racemization Dating Method has been around since the early 1970s. 

Dating is also measured by changes in an object's magnetic field. When the magma from which igneous rocks form is still molten, iron-rich minerals can orient themselves in line with the local magnetic field in the same way that a compass needle does. As the magma cools, the iron crystals are frozen in their orientation in the solid rock. This provides a record of the orientation of the local magnetic field at that time. Paleomagnetics has identified 171 magnetic reversals in the last 76 million years. Geologists developed the paleomagnetic dating technique to measure the movements of the magnetic north pole over geologic time after World War II.

By using lasers researchers can measure parent and daughter atoms in extremely small amounts of matter. This Laser Ablation Spectrometer technique is being refined by NASA for use in dating rocks on Mars. 

Another system of dating fossils is called “bracketing.” Fossils are generally found in sedimentary rock rather than igneous rock. Sedimentary rocks can be dated using radioactive carbon, but because carbon decays relatively quickly, this only works for fossils less than about 50,000 years. To date older fossils scientists look for layers of igneous rock or volcanic ash above and below the fossils. By dating these surrounding layers, they can establish the range.

This method requires understanding how the fossils are affected by geological events like rifts, erosion, folds, etc. which can disturb the layers. Scientists know what to look for to confirm dating and they give as accurate as possible ranges. A certain marine fossil may be dated to between 130,000 and 124,000 years and because it is a marine fossils, we know that the area where it was recovered was once a sea.

To determine the ages of human fossils that are millions of years, scientists need an isotope with a very long half-life. Isotopes used for this purpose are uranium-238, uranium-235, potassium-40, horium-232 and rubidium-87, all found in the human body. Each of these isotopes has a half-life of more than a million years.


Dating of Humans

Two kinds of data are needed in order to obtain a date estimate from present-day Y chromosomes: information about the genetic diversity of the Y chromosomes, and a measure of the mutation rate of the loci used to determine the diversity. Over the last two decades, Y-chromosomal studies have increasingly used Y-STRs to measure genetic diversity. The commonly used Y-STRs are variable in all populations (http://www.yhrd.org/) and mutate quickly enough that their mutation rates can be measured in deep-rooting families or father–son pairs, and refined using information from levels of population variation. Thus Y-STR mutation rates are now estimated with some precision. (Read more here.)

Mitochondrial DNA L groups are extremely archaic. In human mitochondrial genetics, L is the mitochondrial DNA macro-haplogroup that is at the root of the human mtDNA phylogenetic tree. As such, it represents the most ancestral mitochondrial lineage of all currently living modern humans. All modern humans have ancestry that is traced to Africa.

Of special interest to biblical anthropologists is YDNA Haplogroup R1. YDNA R1b is found widely in Africa, the Middle East, Southern Europe, Spain, France, and the British Isles. The dispersion of R1b peoples took place over thousands of years, beginning about 20,000 years ago. Most biblical populations are in this haplogroup. Abraham's ancestors came out of central Africa near Lake Chad and the Upper Nile. Note the dark red spots in those places. The dark spot in central Africa is the region of Lake Chad, Noah's homeland.

Dating Scripture

Dating the Bible is as much a science as dating fossils and rocks. There are few methods that render absolute dates and scholars who study manuscripts likewise date material by giving ranges. One attempt to scientifically date the Pentateuch relies on a chronology established through synchronisms dated by astronomy. The ranges of time for the older Biblical material tend to be greater than for the more recent material. The dating of New Testament books cannot be set with absolute confidence so scholars often give a range, but the range is a matter of a few years or a decade, not a thousand years as is more often the case with the material in Genesis and Exodus. For example, the book of Romans is typically given a range of A.D. 56-58. In the dating of the books and events described in the Bible scholars rely on data found in the Bible and on extra-Biblical sources to help narrow the range. Archaeology, anthropology and linguistics have been especially helpful sciences in the service of Biblical scholarship.

Related reading: Many Groups of Archaic Humans; 1.5 Million Year Foot Print in Kenya; Radio Carbon C14 Dating; Lake Suigetsu and the 60,000 Year Varve Chronology; Dating the Five Books of Moses In Defense of Biblical Anthropology; A Scientific Timeline of Genesis; Gap Theory or Gap Fact?

1.5 Million Year Footprints in Kenya

Archaic human footprint found in Ileret, Kenya
Several sets provide evidence of males travelling in groups.

Archaic human footprints were found near a lake in Ileret, Kenya in the early 2000's. The 22 footprints were discovered in two sedimentary layers dated at 1.51 to 1.53 million years ago, providing the oldest evidence of an essentially modern human–like foot anatomy, with a relatively adducted hallux, medial longitudinal arch, and medial weight transfer before push-off.

The study appears here. The report focused on the anatomy of these footprints and found that these archaic humans ambulated like modern humans. Neil Roach returned to Ileret and found more footprints — about 100. The findings were presented at the annual meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society in San Francisco. These prints represent multiple individuals walking in one direction along a lakeside, possibly hunting for antelope or wildebeest.

Jeremy DeSilva's research showed that Australopithecus lacked the large grasping toe typical of tree climbers, and its spine, pelvis, knees, and ankles were made for walking on two legs. DeSilva compared the ankle joint, the tibia and the talus fossils of human ancestors ("hominins") between 4.12 million to 1.53 million years old, he discovered that all of the ankle joints resembled those of modern humans rather than those of apes. Chimpanzees flex their ankles 45 degrees from normal resting position. This makes it possible for apes to climb trees with great ease. While walking, humans flex their ankles a maximum of 20 degrees. The human ankle bones are quite distinct from those of apes

“Upright walking is such a unique way of moving,” says DeSilva, assistant professor of anthropology at Boston University. “If you look across the animal world, locomotion is so diverse: things fly, things swim. Moving on two legs is odd."

Humans are unique in so many ways.

This discovery of a complete fourth metatarsal of A. afarensis at Hadar shows the deep, flat base and tarsal facets that "imply that its midfoot had no ape-like midtarsal break. These features show that the A. afarensis foot was functionally like that of modern humans." The February 2011 report was written by Carol Ward, William H. Kimbel, and Donald C. Johanson. Johanson worked with Mary Leakey on other significant finds.

Johanson and Leakey were scheduled to speak at a Nobel Symposium in Sweden in May 1978. The conference honored Mary Leakey, who received a medal from the King of Sweden for her scientific investigations. Leakey was embarrassed when Donald C. Johanson announced that his Afar Triangle finds were ape, and included Mary Leakey's 4 million year old Laetoli specimen (jaw bone LH4) from Tanzania as an exhibit. Leakey would have classified her Laetoli finds as Homo/human. She expressed her regret that “the Laetoli fellow is now doomed to be called Australopithecus afarensis.”

Archaic human footprints at Laetoli, Tanzania 

Mary Leakey’s 1979 discoveries of footprints in Tanzania added to the evidence that humans walked the earth over 3 million years ago. At Laetoli, about 25 miles south of Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, Leakey discovered footprints of a man, woman and child created about 3.6 million years ago and preserved under falling ash from the nearby Sadiman volcano. The raised arch and rounded heel of the footprints showed that whoever left these footprints walked as humans walk today.

There is a great deal of ego gratification in naming a "new" stage in human evolution, but analysis of all these footprints indicates that these creatures were fully human. From over 3 million years to the present, there was been a limited amount of physical changes in humans. Devotion to the theory of evolutionary branching of ape and human from a common ancestor is not supported by the data.

Related reading: Was Lucy Human?; Study Reports a Whopping ‘23% of Our Genome’ Contradicts Standard Human-Ape Evolutionary Phylogeny,” Evolution News, June 3, 2011

Answers to High Schoolers' Questions About the Earth

Alice C. Linsley




Part 5:  The Creation of Earth
This continues the series on Answers to High Schooler's Questions About Genesis.


Q:  How old is the Earth?

A:  The earth is about 4.5 billion years old. This is based on radiometric age dating of meteorite material and the earth's oldest rocks, and is consistent with lunar samples. Young-Earth Creationists argue that radiometric dating is not reliable because it contradicts what they believe the Bible says about the age of the Earth.  For the sake of argument, let us consider that radiometric calculations are off by 50%. Were this the case (and it is not), the earth would still be over 2 billion years old.  The oldest human fossils are about 3.6 million years.  Again for the sake of argument, let us consider that the carbon dating of the oldest human fossils is off by 50%.  These humans would still have lived over 1 million years ago

Young-Earth Creationists calculate the Earth's age at 6000 years on the basis of ages assigned to the rulers in the Genesis King Lists.  They assume that Bishop James Ussher's scheme is accurate.  However, Ussher didn't recognize that these lists are not generational, but regnal. The reigns of some kings coincided. For example, Tubal-Cain (Gen. 4) and Methuselah (Gen. 5) ruled at the same time.  Further, these rulers had two wives. The first wife was the bride of the ruler-to-be's youth.  The second wife was a patrilineal cousin and this wedding took place shortly before the heir ascended to the throne. This is why Abraham was anxious for Isaac to marry his cousin bride before he died (Gen. 24).

With two wives, there were two first-born sons.  They ascended to different thrones, but the ruling lines intermarried exclusively. Bishop Ussher didn't take this unique marriage and ascendancy pattern into consideration. He apparently was unaware of its importance.



Q:  How many times has God created Earth?

A:  The creation of the Earth was a singular event according to the Bible. John 1:3 says that everything that was created in the beginning was created from nothing (creatio ex nihilo).  In other words, God did not create from pre-existing elements or from the substance of a previous world.

The idea that God created more than one Earth developed out of Greek Philosophy and can be traced to the thought of Anaximander of Miletus (B.C. 610 – 546). He believed that the universe or “all the heavens and the worlds within them” came from “some boundless nature.” Their existence involved the interaction of the four elements of ancient physics: Earth, Water, Air and Fire.

Anaximander speculated that these elements constantly interact to produce new worlds. This is why some thought this world came about as the result of the explosion of a previously existing world.  He hypothesized that the world originated when a firey ball surrounded Earth like bark on a tree. When the ball broke apart it formed other worlds as hollow concentric circles or spirals, filled with fire.

In his first sermon on creation, Basil the Great argued against Anaximander's view that a world is created by the spiraling motion of the four interactive elements.  He declared, "Do not then imagine, O man! that the visible world is without a beginning; and because the celestial bodies move in a circular course, and it is difficult for our senses to define the point where the circle begins, do not believe that bodies impelled by a circular movement are, from their nature, without a beginning." (The Hexaemeron, Homily I)

This idea of previously existing worlds is not found in the Bible. According to the Bible, God fashioned all the worlds from nothing. Hebrews 11:13 says, "By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the Word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible."



Q:  What existed before God created everything?

A:  No matter existed. Only the triune God existed: Christ the Logos and the Spirit of God were one with God the Father. The Holy Trinity is evident in Genesis 1 and was manifested to John the Baptist and his disciples when Jesus was baptised in the Jordan River. (See Matthew 3:16,17; Mark 1:9-11)

Genesis 1:2 speaks of a void (bohu in Hebrew).  This may be the work of Hellenistic Jews who translated the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) into Greek. That version of the Old Testament is called the Septuagint and it appears to be influenced by Greek Philosophy which debated the idea of motion, matter and a void. John Sailhamer makes this point in his book Genesis Unbound.  The Greek-speaking Jews who translated the Old Testament were likely drawing on the thought of Democritus (460 – ca. 370 BC), a ancient philosopher who argued that any movement would require a void.  Since God is the Unmoved Mover, there was movement at the beginning and therefore a void.  This argument has been used to suggest that God as Unmoved Mover is illogical since, as Democritus asserted, a void cannot exist.

Obviously there is a conflict between the Greek and the Semitic worldviews. As Genesis reflects a Nilo-Semitic worldview, we must look for another explanation of the word bohu.

Genesis 1 describes when God began the work of creation. It uses the words tohu (formless or confused) and bohu (empty or void). The Hebrew phrase "formless and void" (Gen. 1: 2) is tohu wa-bohu and is of Nilotic origin. The word tohu in Isaiah 34:11 means "confused" so it appears that Genesis 1 refers to matter in a confused or chaotic state before God set things in order.

In Nilotic mythology chaos or disorder preceded creation. The Egyptians believed that chaos (tehom) dwelt south of Yebu (Elephantine Island) as a great river serpent between the Nile's east (bahku) and west (manu) banks. The word bohu appears to be related to the word bahku, the direction from which the Sun rose and filled the valley with light - And God said, "Let there be light and there was light." (Gen. 1:3)




Q:  How did everything just appear when God spoke?

A:  The Word of God generates life. This is what John explains in the Prologue to his Gospel:  "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men." John 1:1-4

Basil the Great explains, "It must be well understood that when we speak of the voice, of the word, of the command of God, this divine language does not mean to us a sound which escapes from the organs of speech, a collision of air struck by the tongue; it is a simple sign of the will of God."  (The Hexaemeron, Homily II)



Q:  Could God have created the world through evolution?

A:  Evolution is an explanation for how species emerge, adapt and survive. Darwin's observations about the complexity, diversity, adaptability and survival of species do not address the question of the origin of matter.  His hypothesis that humans and apes had a common ancestor has never been proven. There is no physical evidence that this is true.

Some Christians believe that God created the different species by the processes described in evolutionary theory. Their view is called "Theistic Evolution" and has grown in popularity among Evangelicals. 

Other theories held by Christians include Intelligent Design, the Framework Theory, Progressive Creationism, Age-Day Creationism, Gap Theory Creationism, and Young-Earth Creationism. These are described here.

Genesis tells us that God created in an orderly fashion over a period of time and according to a plan. It is the work of science to discover the order and the work of theologians and Bible scholars to discern the plan. For Abraham's ancestors the order was perceived as fixed, though they recognized flux within the fixed boundaries. Their acute observation of the patterns in nature suggested a divine plan.

If the biblical worldview is true, no discrepancy should exist between genetics and the biblical assertion that the order of creation is fixed with genetic boundaries between "kinds."  Specific fixed boundaries exist within the DNA code. This explains why humans reproduce humans and not some other animal. Further, while the similarity of humans to apes may suggest a common origin, this common ancestor is not known to have existed.  A common ancestor exists in the imaginations of artists who draw images for Biology books.

Evolutionary theory rests on many unconfirmed and often ludicrous assumptions.  For example, some assume that because nurse sharks and camels share an antigen receptor protein they are descended from a common ancestor. However, the DNA sequences that code for the proteins are different between sharks and camels. 




Q:  Why did God take seven days to create?

A:  Actually,the first creation story says that God created in six days and rested on the seventh.

According to Genesis 1, God created in an orderly fashion over a period of time.  Order implies duration of time.  Consider how time passes as you write the letters of the alphabet in order.  Seconds pass as you draw each on the paper.  Time began to pass, like a ticking clock, from the moment that God created matter and space.



Q:  Were the seven days of creation 24-hour days?

A:  Genesis 1 suggests that the seven days are to be taken as 24-hour days.  However, Genesis 2 says that God created everything in a single day.  In both creation stories the Hebrew word for day is yom. This word is used in the Bible to mean a 24-hour day or an unspecified duration of time.



Q:  When Genesis says "hovered over the waters" does that mean that water existed before God formed the earth? Or was this water over an unformed earth?

A:  According to the ancient Nilotic peoples, the world emerged as a dry mound rising up from the primordial ocean. Because the Sun is essential to life on earth, the first rising of Ra (the Creator whose emblem was the Sun) marked the moment of the world's emergence. This is why God's first words in Genesis are "let there be light" and why St. John says that Christ, the Word, was the real light that was coming into the world. (John 1:9)




Q: How could water come up from the ground if it hadn't rained yet?

A:  Genesis 2:4-6 says "On the day that God made earth and heaven there was as yet no wild bush on the earth nor had any wild plant sprung up for Yahweh God had not sent rain on the earth, nor was there any man to till the soil. Instead, water flowed out of the ground and watered the whole surface of the soil."

This picture of the primeval Earth as a watery world is consistent with the cosmology of Abraham's Nilotic ancestors from whom we receive this account. They believed that the dry ground emerged from a universal ocean.  It is also consistent with scientific findings that suggest that 2.5 billion years ago oceans covered most of the planet. Just 2% to 3% of the Earth's surface would have been dry land, compared with 28% today.




Q: Where was the Garden of Eden?

A:  Eden is described as a vast watery region that extended from the Nile to Mesopotamia.  The writer of Genesis 2-3 says that God prepared a garden somewhere in this region and placed the first humans there.  This is also the region where the oldest human fossils have been found. This is the ancient Afro-Asiatic Dominion and the place of origin of the Genesis rulers and of "him that holds the scepter from the house of Eden" (Amos 1:5).

Genesis 2:10-14 says that Eden was watered by four rivers: the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Pishon and the Gihon. The Tigris and Euphrates are in Mesopotamia and the Pishon and Gihon are in Africa. The Ethiopians identify the Gihon with the Abay River, which encircles the former Kushite kingdom of Gojjam. The Pishon "flows through the whole land of Havilah" (Gen. 2:11). Havilah is a son of Kush (Gen. 10:7) and the "Kushites" lived in the Upper Nile region and the Sudan. Kushite kings also ruled in Egypt.

The description of Eden as a well-watered region is supported by climate and geological studies. These four rivers encompass the heart of the ancient Afro-Asiatic Dominion which was ruled by a network of chief priests. They controlled the major water systems and built shrines along the rivers.



Q: Where do dinosaurs fit in the story of creation?

A:

Dinosaurs are not mentioned in the Genesis creation accounts. These accounts speak of great diversity and an hierarchy within the animal world, but the peoples from whom we receive the creation stories did not have any direct experience of dinosaurs. Likely they had oral traditions about great creatures that once lived on the Earth. They may have associated the avian dinosaur with the serpent-dragon. This dragon was called by the RahuKetu (drawing from the Ancient Egyptian words Ra and Ketu). The avian dinosaurs survived after the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

Scientists have identified seven major global and local dinosaur subgroups during the latest Cretaceous period. The large herbivores, such as ceratopsids and hadrosauroids, appear to have been in decline for some time before their extinction. Carnivorous dinosaurs, mid-sized herbivores, and some Asian species appear to have fared better. Their populations were thriving and appear to have disappeared rather suddenly.

The reason for the extinction of the dinosaurs is still a mystery.  However, most scientists believe that their extinction was environment and likely triggered by the impact on Earth of a large asteroid or comet.  Evidence for such events have been identified in the Yucatan and in Siberia. An object 10 kilometers across struck Earth off the coast of the Yucatan peninsula 65 million years ago.

It is believed that this caused dense clouds of dust that blocked the sun's rays. The darker and colder environment caused many plants to die and these were the food source of the large bulk-feeding herbivores.  According to this theory, once the dust cleared greenhouse gases caused temperatures to skyrocket and the frigid and sweltering climatic extremes caused the extinction of up to 70 percent of all plants and animals living at the time.

Another theory involves global volcanic activity. Massive beds of ancient lava found around the world depict an Earth where volcanic eruptions were commonplace. According to this theory, volcanic activity spewed gas, ash, and dust into the atmosphere, blocking light from the sun. Plant production plummeted, and dinosaurs that were poorly adapted to the harsh conditions perished.



Related reading: YEC Dogma is NOT Biblical; Tehut's Victory Over Tehom; Bishop Ussher Goofed; The Nilotic Substrata of Genesis 1; Biblical Anthropologists Discuss Darwin

The Age of Earth

A reader of Just Genesis has sent 9 questions which she would like for me to address. I will post answers to these questions in the next few weeks. The first question is: "What do you believe about the age of the Earth?"

Answer: I believe that science is a reliable source of information about the age of the Earth and that science and Scripture are not in conflict on this question.

The Earth is at least 3.5 billion years old because the oldest Earth rocks date to about 3.5 billion years. These are dated using several radiometric dating methods. Rocks dating to 3.5 billion years have been found on five continents. Some of these rocks include minerals which are as old as 4.2 billion years. Rocks of this age are fairly rare however.

Most scientists place the Earth's age at between 4.2 and 4.55 billion years and the universe at about 14 billion years. (For more on this, go here.)

Bishop Usher's dating of the Earth at 10,000 years is based on a misunderstanding of the nature of the Genesis genealogies, some of which are telescopic, leaving out some of the ruler-priests who might have appeared in a complete sequential listing. He also didn't recognize that Cain and Seth, who are presented as the offspring of Adam and Eve, lived at a time when tribal government, laws and religious offices were already well established.

Analysis of the Genesis 4 and 5 geneological information reveals that Cain and Seth married sisters who were the daughters of an African chief named Nok (Enoch). The Nok civilization was in west central Africa and is dated to between 30,000 and 2000 years ago. Cain lived closer to the time of Noah's flood (about 8000 years ago) than he did to the time of the appearance of the oldest known human fossils dating to 160,000 years ago.

The 160,000 date for the first "modern humans" is disputed by some who believe that older fossils dating to 3 million years also represent human populations despite the nomenclature of convergence evolutionists and the artistic drawings of ape-like creatures.

Scientists have found a fish dating to 350 million years and the Fossil Fuels Brewing Company produces beer from a yeast strain that has lain dormant for up to 45 million years.

To read the various theories of creation, go here.