See! We CAN tie ourselves in biblical knots,,,

GAry 7

1. Nowhere in the Bible does it state that the Earth is 6,000 years old. This number was invented by scholars who estimated the lifetimes of each generation mentioned in the Bible, adding, before that, 7 days to create the universe.

It didn’t require much estimation, the “begats” (so-and-so begat so-and-so), along with lifespans, are fairly complete in the bible.

2. The Bible does however mention that time is relative. Which is impressive for a book written 2,000 years before Einstein:

“A day is as a thousand years, a thousand years is as a day.”

So the Bible itself tells you not to take the time listed in the Bible literally.

Except it refers to there being “day and night”, and besides even 17,000 years is still orders of magnitude off from what it should be.

3. Why must every generation have been written in the Bible? Is God really that verbose?

Apparently he is. It explicitly states that a certain person is the child of another person, and how long those people lived.

I was thinking about how people could possibly believe the Earth is 6,000 years old, when geologic evidence (irrefutable evidence collected for centuries) points to 4.5 billion years for the Earth, and astronomy has shown that the universe is about 13.7 billion years old.

If the universe and everything in it were only 6,000 years old, we would be unable to see any stars further away than 6,000 lightyears, because the light would not have reached us yet. This is clearly not the case.

If the Earth itself were only 6,000 years old, it would still be molten lava from the giant impact that formed the moon. Obviously this is not the case.

In any case, let’s ignore the evidence for a second and just apply some logic to the Bible.

1. Nowhere in the Bible does it state that the Earth is 6,000 years old. This number was invented by scholars who estimated the lifetimes of each generation mentioned in the Bible, adding, before that, 7 days to create the universe.

2. The Bible does however mention that time is relative. Which is impressive for a book written 2,000 years before Einstein:

“A day is as a thousand years, a thousand years is as a day.”

So the Bible itself tells you not to take the time listed in the Bible literally.

3. Why must every generation have been written in the Bible? Is God really that verbose?

Even an amateur author knows that there are times when it is wise to skip ahead in the plot. Has every generation of humans that ever lived done something worth mentioning? Isn’t it logical to assume that sometimes there was simply nothing worth mentioning, so God (or the writers who transcribed the Bible) simply skipped ahead?

Saying that the Earth is 6,000 years old is ultimately a sign of a lack of faith, not a confirmation of it. You are limiting your God to being a poor writer who blabs all day about irrelevancies. I doubt He appreciates the sentiment.

So the next time you see someone bring up the “the Earth is only 6,000 years old” crap, direct them to this post.

There is no gravity. The universe sucks.