Many people read Genesis chapter 1 and are happy to "just believe it". They can't see what all the fuss is about. If that's you I commend you and suggest you skip to the next blog entry. If you're like me however your passion for science and the bible often draw you back to this passage and it would be a great omission in my blog to ignore the issues raised by it. So let's put the matters of timescale, sequence and mechanism in front of us and enjoy going down a little side track for a moment.
First there is the question of time. How long did it take to get from the creation of the universe, or our planet at least, to man. The scientific evidence for an old earth (ie greater than 10,00 years) is strong, for example sedimentary rock and radio metric dating methods. Even someone as sound as Wayne Grudem, the Delia Smith of Theology, feels the weight of these things. OK, I'll explain, most kitchen bookshelves I see have a Delia Smith's cook book on them, and every bible students book shelf seems to have a copy of one of Wayne's books on systematic theology. And for good reason. I had the privilege a few years ago of sitting on the front row of three days of lectures given by Wayne Grudem and along with two friends were used as an analogy to the trinity. You can get the "Christian Beliefs" lectures on DVD if you want from clearcutmedia.
The bible however doesn't seem to give any hint of an old earth. If you add up the geologies like Bishop Usher did you get something like 6000 years (or to be more precise it all kicked off the night before 23rd October 4044BC). There are of course gaps in the genealogies he used but are there really gaps of thousands of generations?
The Hebrew word translated day is ‘yom’ and has a similar range of meaning. It can mean 24 hours or an unspecified long period of time depending on the context. If the latter then we have some long general chunks of time. We might even allow a little overlapping although the clear beginnings and ends of each day seem to provide clear cut-offs. The 24 hour day isn't easily shrugged off, as if we let scripture interpret scripture we need to factor in Ex 20:11 where God says "In six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth". Just read that Mark Driscoll goes for a literal six day creation but with the possibility of a gap in between Gen 1:1 and 1:2. The gap theory also has to answer to Ex 20:11.
In defence of long days there is no sun till day three, plants seem to grow very quickly on day 3 and in one sense the seventh day has not ended. In going for this however I not only have to face up to Moses’ comparison of creation days with our week of seven 24 hour days but make a stab at fitting the scientific sequence of events to the biblical sequence. It's not that easy. Here is the generally accepted scientific time line:
Nothing or a bubbling froth of universes appearing and disappearing.
Our universes' big bang
Universe 11 billion years ago (bya)
Earth 4.6 (bya)
Tiny-life 4 (bya)
Big-life 580 million years ago (mya)
Plants 490 mya
Fish 370 mya
Animals 350 mya
Dinosaurs 230 mya
Birds 150 mya
Modern Humans 200 thousand years ago (tya)
Spiritual artefacts 24 tya
Göbekli Tepe, oldest known man-made place of worship 11 tya
Permanent settlements, tool use, domestication of animals 10 tya
Larger states in Mesopotamia, the Nile and Indus Valleys 5-6 tya
The biblical time line is:
day 0 Watery planet (there is darkness and Spirit hovering over waters)
day 1 Light created
day 2 Sky created (clouds? water canopy?)
day 3 Land appears and vegetation produced from ground
day 4 Sun and moon and stars
day 5 Sea creatures and birds
day 6 Land animals and Adam and Eve
Although there are small organisms around in the sea before plants the main problem is that we don't get birds until after land animals. I think someone proposed day 5 is talking about insects but I'm not that convinced.
I find the Framework view which looks at the passage poetically more attractive. It recognises the unusual style of the text and the other symmetries and patterns in it (days 1-3 create space and days 4-6 fill them...kind of). Although it's not an obvious way of reading the text and can leave you wondering if smoke and mirrors have been used it doesn't force me to make a decision on the age of the earth or sequence of events.
In terms of mechanism ie in what way did it all happen there is a lot of scientific evidence for what's called common descent. That is every living organism had a common ancestor at some time in the past. This is distinct from any particular theory of how changes occurs. Several trees of common descent can be built up by looking at different aspects of organisms:
i) How they look
ii) When they appear in the fossil record
iii) Where they existed on the earth
iv) DNA comparisons including mutation and retro virus insertion.
The fact that these trees are said to end up being rather similar to each other strengthens the argument for common descent like threads twisted together make up a stronger rope.
The bible however seems at first sight to describe the instantaneous miraculous appearance of animals reproducing according to their own kind. I don't think that's necessarily the only interpretation and am happy to credit God with not just the "wow" of immediate appearance but the beautiful sophistication of evolution. Would the sudden appearance of galaxies be better in some way than their exploding and swirling into place? I don't think so.
If you want to follow this up further you might want to look at www.talkorigins.org and www.answersingenesis.org. I've had many a happy evening ping ponging between these two sites.
Hope you're still with me, especially if you are strongly in one camp or the other of the creation/evolution debate. Although I love thinking about all this I struggle to see how it makes much difference to me, or increases or decreases God's glory. Anyway, let's press on to more fertile ground.
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