Do Plants Before Animals Mean Young Earth?

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

@Faithdefender

It sounds like you’re saying there was light over all of the earth except in the Garden of Eden when the beginning of human history began. Yet then why would the Bible go on to explain that God separated the light from the darkness?

Because he is telling the story of all creation in a six day telling. This is like going to a movie, or a play. God is showing what he did for the narrator to tell us. See A Telling in Six Ordinary Days.

[Faithdefender]

I read the summary of A Telling in 6 Days, but I don’t think that’s the problem here. We’re not talking about perception of time. We’re talking about the information given. If I went to a historical movie, I would still want the information to be accurate regrdless of how I perceive the length of the movie. God said he created the sun and the moon on the fourth day. It doesn’t matter how much longer after he created light.

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

@Faithdefender

It doesn’t matter how much longer after he created light.

Oh I see the confusion.

Did you know in the mainstream science account that light exists long before the sun exists? That actually makes sense from a historical point of view.

[deuteroKJ (Kenneth Turner)]

@Faithdefender

if you believe both that the days in Genesis are long periods of time and that life came into existence in the order recorded

Those are two big if’s that are unnecessary

@Faithdefender

in the Amplified Bible

This is not a translation but a translation with inserted commentary notes (that necessarily push a certain interpretation). In a study like this, I strongly encourage you to stick to the standard English translations.

@swamidass

For this reason, many literalists understand Genesis 1 to be about the creation of a localized area in six ordinary days, told from the perspective of a man with feet on the ground. This localized area could be Canaan, or the Garden. In a literal interpretation, however, it is very hard to imagine how this could possibly be the creation of the universe, the globe, or anything other than a localized view of the land. Remember, before day 1, it depicts the Spirit of God hovering over the water, which means that the planet earth preexists day one.

@swamidass

Genesis 1:1 appears to be referring to the beginning of all Creation.

@swamidass

I disagree. The text says “eretz” which cannot mean the globe of the earth. They did not have a concept of the planet earth. The term is better translated “land.”

@Faithdefender

Yes the earth did exist before day one, but it also says that the earth was formless and void.

@swamidass

Once again that term “earth” is tripping you up. It has to mean earth as in “land” not the planet earth. They did not have a concept of a planet earth.

With that in mind, it appears to be literally describing, from the perspective a person on the surface of the earth, , the spirit of the Lord over a body of water, which is over a land. It is describing the creation of this region, not of the planet earth.

@swamidass

A literal reading is not the problem. If you are relying on the english text alone, without sensitivity to the underlying Hebrew, you are going to get a strange interpretation. This is particularly true if the translation is not good, and the people you have been learning are motivated to argue for a young earth for reasons other than Scripture.

@deuteroKJ thoughts?

There are several issues here, but I’ll keep it as brief as possible. First, while @swamidass is correct that they had no concept of globe/planet Earth, I think translating “land” over-interprets in the opposite direction (unless one follows Sailhamer and Postell that from v. 2 on, it’s only the land of Canaan…they would still take “heavens and earth” in v.1 to be “everything” or “universe”). Usually, “land” or “region” in these discussions connote a limited part of the overall land/earth (where “earth” is used for the land universally). While the ancients didn’t have a concept of globe/planet, they could think of the universal “earth” as all the land in the world (whatever shape or extent they conceived it).

Second, it does seem the only viable reading is that the state of v. 2 precedes the 6 Days. This is true whether one takes v. 1 to be a title of the whole chapter (i.e., “In the beginning God created…oh and this is how he did it”) or a subordinate clause (e.g., “When God began to create…”) to either v. 2 or v. 3 (in the latter case, v. 2 would be a parenthetical comment describing the state of affairs before v. 1 or vv. 3ff happened). The one option I think least likely based on Hebrew syntax is that v.1 is an initial creative act, resulting in v. 2. (I don’t consider the gap theory as an option at all.)

What this boils down to is that it’s not obvious that Gen 1 is teaching creatio ex nihilo (though the Bible elsewhere does, as well as orthodox theology)…It also raises the question what “create” means exactly in the text itself. We need to be willing to see a distinction between the local, exegetical meaning and the broader theological meaning. That is, we (Christians) would all agree that God created what we see in v. 2, but it’s not clear to me that the text of Gen 1 is teaching this specifically (in fact, I think the evidence is against it).

Third, I’d encourage people to try to draw a picture of v. 2 (v. 4 is fun too). It’s impossible. You can’t draw a formless earth (unless you change the word picture). Of course, one can draw the Spirit as a hovering bird (i.e., “hovering” is a word picture of a bird over its nest), but that must be a metaphor based on orthodox theology (and the word “spirit” can mean “wind”; either makes sense in light of the anit-creation account of the Flood).

[J.E.S (Jonathan)]

@swamidass

The text says “eretz” which cannot mean the globe of the earth.

Who says? If I am not mistaken, “eretz” is the word used for “earth” in Genesis 1:1 as well. If Genesis 1 is supposed to be the account of creation, then it would, of course, mention God’s creation of the world (the “globe”). And that would be the entire world (the planet even if that terminology is not used), not just a limited section of land, correct? Even if the Israelites did not have the concept of a globe and “eretz” does not translate to “globe,” that should not prevent “eretz” from meaning “the landmass(es) of the world,” especially given the usage in Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:10, where “eretz” refers to the “dry land” (as separated from the waters).

@swamidass

This is not talking about the spread of biological humans across the globe, but of the spread of civilization in the region.

I would submit that it is about both. Genesis 10 does indeed speak of the spread of civilization in the Middle East, but it also includes Genesis 10:32 (and maybe more) to show that civilization spread to the rest of the Earth (the landmass[es]) as well.

That is my understanding of this, and you are free to disagree with me (as that’s a part of what PS is all about), but I am inclined to believe that this is closer to the authorial intent and more faithful to the Hebrew text of the passages in question.