Are the doctrines of recent creation and a diluvial origin of geologic
strata found in God=92s Word?
An informed Bible student would answer, No. While the Bible clearly
states that the heavens and the earth and everything in them were
created by God, it does not say when those things were created. Most
creationist were shackled by the religious dogma that the six creative
days in Genesis were all encompassed in a period of 144 hours. This
harks back to an erroneous fundamentalist teaching that was not
challenged by the science of the 17th century, but that is no longer
tenable in the light of present knowledge. The Bible itself does not
set any such time limit on the days of creation.
The first verse of Genesis simply says, =93In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth.=94 If we take this to mean the creation of
the starry heavens, the galaxies, and the solar system of which the
earth is a part, we are talking about events that preceded the first
creative day. The description of the earth=92s condition in verse 2 also
precedes the first day. Not until verses 3 to 5 do we enter upon the
activity of the first day of creation.
So no matter how long the days might prove to be, verses 1 and 2
describe things already accomplished, and they fall outside any time
frame encompassing the creative days. If geologists want to say that
the earth is 4 billion years old, or astronomers want to make the
universe 20 billion years old, the Bible student has no quarrel with
them. The Bible simply does not indicate the time of those events.
The next point to note is that the word =93day=94 is used in many
different senses in the Bible. It does not always mean a 24-hour
period. Sometimes it means only the hours of sunlight, that is, 12,
more or less. Sometimes it stands for a year. Sometimes it means the
years during a certain generation. In several references a day is
1,000 years, and in some even longer. No doubt the days in Genesis
chapter 1 were very much longer. But the Bible does not there say how
long they were.
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