In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.

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In the Beginning God Created the Heavens and the Earth

Introductory Reading: Genesis 1

One of the vexatious questions of science today concerns the age of the earth. Why would this be an important issue? It is an issue because it has a profound influence on the way people understand the origin and purpose of life, and because if we can understand origins, we are better able to develop new things as we will understand how the plans work.

Ancient records from many cultures speak of the origin of life as a fairly recent phenomena, the result of the creative power and acts of a great being; scientists of this era suggest life is millions of years old, and the earth even older. There are strong opinions for both viewpoints, which cannot be reconciled. Is it possible to come to any undisputable position of truth in the matter?

Fundamentally, it is not possible to come to an indisputable position, and the reason is quite simply because we cannot turn back the clock! What we have to do instead is evaluate the various belief systems, and choose the one which makes most sense, the one which has the most secure foundation. Even within the ranks of the main opinions we find experts sniping at their own colleagues, both in the scientific and the religious communities. It is little wonder then that ordinary folk might be perplexed, or even worse, just accept whatever proposition happens to be presented to them, without wanting to question or understand the issues.

If the boffins and propeller heads cannot agree among themselves how this world and our creation came about, then what chance have we of coming to grips with the answers, if there be any? There are answers, and there are good answers, and there are different and often mutually exclusive answers. The answer which is right is the one which satisfies our personal need to know, and which is consistent with all the evidence we can understand.

When we discuss this topic, there are so many things we cannot know, cannot test, cannot prove, cannot repeat, that we have to accept them at face value. The crucial thing is to understand the value, then we will be able to accept what we cannot prove, where it is consistent with the value. We move into the realms of faith.

We make no apology for thinking of this subject in terms of faith where others may require hard and incontrovertible facts. Faith is required whatever position you adopt, whether the idea that this entire solar system, including our earth, came into being about six thousand years ago, or six million years ago, or however many billions of years we want to think. None of the arguments concerning the physical nature of the development of our earth are as secure as the fossils are embedded in the rocks! What we do know undeniably as facts, can only lead us to conclusions which depend upon our interpretation of the facts. Our conclusions will therefore be sensitive to the context in which we examine them.

How many have heard the story of the men of the Blind Men of Indostan and the Elephant?

The Story of the Blind Men and the Elephant, by John Godfrey Saxe

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant

Though all of them were blind,

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant

And, happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl:

"God bless me, but the Elephant

Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling the tusk,

Cried, "Ho! what have we here

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me 'tis very clear

This wonder of an Elephant

Is very like a spear!"

The Third approached the animal

And, happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands,

Thus boldly up he spake:

"I see," quoth he, "The Elephant

Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,

And felt about the knee:

"What most the wondrous beast is like

Is very plain," quoth he;

"Tis clear enough the Elephant

Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,

Said, "Even the blindest man

Can tell what this resembles most;

Deny the fact who can:

This marvel of an elephant

Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope

Than, seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope,

"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant

Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong.

Though each was partly in the right,

They all were in the wrong!

Why is this a cautionary tale in our context? We, and the scientific experts who have studied the matter of the beginnings of the earth, are like these blind men of Indostan, we can only see one small part of the picture, and our conclusions may not be consistent with the whole, although individually they may be reasonable. The impediment we have is the inability to see what happened before we were here to witness it.

Now we can go back to an earlier point, that we need to evaluate the various belief systems, and choose the one which in context makes most sense. This is likely to lead us closest to the path of truth. It will come as no surprise that we are to discuss the Biblical approach to the problem. What may come as a surprise is that the Bible is not in conflict with scientific evidence, rather, it conflicts from time to time with the interpretations made on the basis of that evidence. Different interpretations arise because of different perspectives, like the blind men and the elephant.

As a starting point, assume this creation dates back to 4004 BC. An English Bishop named Ussher took his Bible and after carefully going through all the dates and time spans, suggested the earth was created about four millennia before the birth of Christ. His work was quite thorough, and can be checked by anyone with the patience to work out the genealogies given in the early Biblical records. Many Bibles, even today, use Ussher's chronology, and if yours has a date at the top of the page, it probably derives from Ussher's work.
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Geochronological Time Measurement

We would also like to quote some figures in a discussion by an evolutionist about the age of the earth as determined by various methods of geochronology. The book is called "The Facts of Life", and it was written by Richard Milton, who indicates in this book that he does not believe in creation. His book was written to illustrate the serious flaws in the methods and conclusions used by the evolutionist community in its assessment of dates and its interpretation of the fossil and geological records. Milton explains how he gets these figures, ...

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