Six-Day Creation: Is it worth the battle?

[a mere housewife]

I'm obviously not a Hebrew or Greek scholar or scholar of any sort but wanted to insert a note that I have never met anybody of any millenial view who took Revelation literally: no one I know of any persuasion has ever claimed that a seven headed beast would literally rise from the sea. What you have to deal with in Genesis if you don't want to take it as a factual account, is that unlike Revelation it naturally can be taken as such. The burden of proof is on why it should not be, and I agree that in the cases I've known where it hasn't, it has been a matter not of the language of the text but of reconciling a view in the inerrancy of Scripture with scientific 'facts'.

PD: as I understand, the discussion is not talking about God's secret will but about what He has revealed. It is faith, not presumption, to bind Him to what He has revealed -- for He has bound Himself to that and it's the only accurate knowledge we have of Him; without the willingness of faith to bind God to His own words we are left without any religion at all. The debate is not about what He can and can't do but about what He has said He did do, and how it is natural for us creatures to understand what He has spoken in our language. In other words if I accepted this particular argument you've made about binding God to His own day language, it would be presumptuous of me, confessing an ignorance of the secret will of God, to 'bind' Him to any particular reading of any text of Scripture -- including passages about redemption. Why should I bind Him to the literal meaning of any of the words He's used? That kind of argument leads to a God who speaks nonsense because He can't be 'bound' to human speech.

I believe the whole idea of divine revelation is that the unlimited God, who can do anything, is unlimited and able enough to speak plainly to His creatures in their words, and has been (for lack of a better way to express myself) humble, gracious enough to do so. I can't help seeing an attack on a literal, natural reading of Genesis as something of an attack on this truth. I don't believe people who take it any other way are heretics over this issue (C. S. Lewis is still one of my favorite Christian authors and I believe a much better Christian than many who hold the opposite) but I do think it is a very dangerous position to hold: the argument you made above seems to me, to be rather dangerous.

 

[RamistThomist]

I'm obviously not a Hebrew or Greek scholar or scholar of any sort but wanted to insert a note that I have never met anybody of any millenial view who took Revelation literally: no one I know of any persuasion has ever claimed that a seven headed beast would literally rise from the sea.

Umm...given my view on fairy tales...nah, never mind. Would probably derail the thread and I would lose all credibility.

 

[a mere housewife]

Laughing.

I don't rule out the reality of many aspects of fairy tale either, though the genre as a whole is different than the genre of for instance, biography. & literally, Revelation claims to be a 'vision', and something experienced 'in the spirit', that must be rightly understood.

{edit: besides, if you believe in fairy tales, how can you be premil? The fairy tale should be the most definitive argument against your position! Premil takes all the fairy tales and turns them flat at the climax into bad sci-fi. I don't believe you really believe in dragons or you'd be amil like me. -still laughing, by the way}

 

[panta dokimazete]

Huh? I doubt a Darwinist would agree with the presuppositional approach embedded in my statement.

Of course he would agree, for in the previous post you mentioned I am certain that not all scientific presuppositions are damaging to the reading. So which scientific presuppositions do we accept, and why? Don't answer. I know you are going to give the right orthodox answer, but given your criteria you can't be consistent on it. Can I apply scientific reasoning to the Resurrection?

Must it be all or nothing? Is the scientific method anathema?

I acknowledge the mystery of God's will - where He has not given an exhaustive account, I do not press an exhaustive understanding.

You have shifted the terms. We are talking about clarity, not exhaustivity.

I am not trying to move the goalposts, I am really only asking why this matter matters?

I have acknowledged that capitulating even an iota to a naturalistic presupposition is condemnable - my point is - none of us know for sure since Genesis is not exhaustive (btw: define clear) certainly not in the exhaustive manner that God has laid out His plan for the glorification of Christ and the salvation of the Elect - and the interpretation of the Genesis "day" really does not impact faith or practice...a person seeking rationale to disobey would only find some other way of disobedience.

If you want to believe that God created the universe in an absolute space of 1 literal exhaustively defined day (24 hour delineating down past the nano-second - what can God do in a nano-second?) as Man has understood the span of time from antiquity, that is fine, but I think it is the height of the fundamentalist worldview (the bad sort of fundamentalism ) to ignore the complexity of time relativity and physics to the degree that one would disallow serving office based on it.

 

[panta dokimazete]

In other words if I accepted this particular argument you've made about binding God to His own day language, it would be presumptuous of me, confessing an ignorance of the secret will of God, to 'bind' Him to any particular reading of any text of Scripture -- including passages about redemption. Why should I bind Him to the literal meaning of any of the words He's used? That kind of argument leads to a God who speaks nonsense because He can't be 'bound' to human speech.

Well - in a sense He cannot be bound - God has spoken exhaustively concerning the salvation of Man through His Spirit-inspired workman - can anyone say they have a perfect understanding of it?

Can anyone say they have a perfect understanding of what it is to be God and Man at the same time?

Does anyone claim to have a perfect understanding of the Trinity?

Why should we presume to understand perfectly the working out of creation in time just because God used the symbols and units of Man through Man to describe His work?

It seems arrogant to presume in areas not exhaustively determined.

I would also contend that God binds us to His words, not vice versa.

 

[MW]

How can one have a literal "morning and evening" on the first 3 days when the Sun was created on the fourth day? By definition a "morning" and an "evening" need both a sun and an earth (otherwise there's not sunrise and sunsets). If you say "morning and evening" = a 24 hour period then you've ceased to read the text literally, because it doesn't say 24 hours it says "morning and evening".

Marty, if you read the text literally you will notice that it doesn't speak about the sun but the "light bearer." In biblical cosmology the sun is merely a governor of the day, not the "God" of it. God controls the revolution of time, and He does so by alternating light and darkness. The sun, moon, and stars are merely the markers of this alternation. See also the creation hymns of Pss. 19 and 104.

 

[panta dokimazete]

I do think it is a very dangerous position to hold: the argument you made above seems to me, to be rather dangerous.

I tend to disagree - I feel it fits my "handle" - I believe God is glorified when we seek to the limits of our reason, see His inestimable mystery smiling back at us and still rest in Christ.

 

[MW]

The question of God and time is a complex one, but we should never think God's transcendence of time means He is incapable of operating within it. Notice especially the miracle of the manna. God gave the manna six days of man's week and withheld it on the seventh day. There is no reason to suppose these days were different for God and man. While God's understanding of time infinitely exceeds man's understanding of it, there is nevertheless a corresponding point at which both commune together in real human time and space due to the gracious condescension of God.

 

[a mere housewife]

JD, in one way I'm glad you don't see the dangers that I see in your argument because then your holding to them would be unlike what I know of you; please know that I'm certain you're not trying to play with the reliability of trusting in the words of Scripture to convey a specific content etc; it's just that's what I, as a normal lay-person, see that kind of argument logically leading to.

I'll try to be less confusing. Genesis says that God spoke, and creation came to be; and that God did this in an evening/morning/six day cycle. The account reads like a narrative, not like the symbolic portions of Scripture (which as pointed out about Revelation literally claim to be symbolic, and which no one naturally reads literally). If I determine for scientific or any other reason than the nature of the language itself that I can't know what God means by 'day' citing epistemic humility, then how can I know what God means when He talks elsewhere about Christ being 'born' of a virgin? If exhaustive or absolute knowledge has to be given to us in order for us to know what God means when He uses words then language can have no meaning whatsoever because we are by nature incapable of such knowledge. I consider that God has graciously bound Himself to His words because He has spoken and He cannot lie: I can count on them and indeed apart from being able to do so I have no approach to knowledge of Him. I consider that I can understand them because they are addressed to me inside my own limitations. I consider that an argument that I cannot know what His words mean because they don't speak exhaustively undermines not only the concept of God revealing Himself to limited creatures at all, but of language entirely; it undermines the only approach I have to the knowledge of Him: we have exhaustive revelation about nothing, and if language requires such in order to have meaning then language can convey nothing.

If God says he did something in a day in a narrative section of Scripture, then whatever the limits of my reason, and precisely because He has addressed me within them, I accept it. If there is a reason in the language itself to take it some other way that's different. But to modify my understanding of what naturally reads like a narrative because of the complexity of scientific theories is unacceptable:

1. Because science is always a theory: we have no more absolute or exhaustive truth about the nature of the universe then we have about God: indeed the certainty of faith in revelation is more sure than science. This is especially so in the realm of origins and space: you spoke of the scientific method but with regard to origins and outer space we make models but can't experiment or observe with what is out of our reach. Have you read Owen Barfield's Worlds Apart? It's pretty devastating as to the pretentiousness of science trying to speak to origins; and he wasn't a Christian.

2. Scientific theory is always changing. The meaning of language would have to change with it.

3. How do we determine, if science determines the meaning of words, how the language of science is used in areas like origins and outer space that we can't observe? Are they speaking literally or figuratively about the universe?

Context is the natural way of determining the meaning of human speech. I would rather allow God speaking to me on my own level, with my own concepts, in words that mean something in my own inexhaustive knowledge, to determine my understanding of origins than try to determine what God means by changing scientific theories.

That said, once again, I certainly don't mean to accuse you of being dishonest with Scripture etc. I hope that clarifies my position; I probably won't argue for it further as I don't know how better to say what I mean.

 

[panta dokimazete]

The question of God and time is a complex one, but we should never think God's transcendence of time means He is incapable of operating within it. Notice especially the miracle of the manna. God gave the manna six days of man's week and withheld it on the seventh day. There is no reason to suppose these days were different for God and man. While God's understanding of time infinitely exceeds man's understanding of it, there is nevertheless a corresponding point at which both commune together in real human time and space due to the gracious condescension of God.

No contest - God works in time - in a similar manner He works in space - and graciously communes with us - but - when God was walking in the Garden, was He limited by it? No - He is simultaneously sustaining the Universe and dwelling inside and outside of it - yet that is not all recorded in Scripture - there is enormous unknown activity happening while He abides in space-time - in the same way the true nature of Creation is mysterious - time was created by God for His purpose and how He truly interacts in/with/through it is unknown. Thus, while we see "evening and morning" the first day" - we have no comprehension of what that truly means in terms of space-time manipulation.

Creation (time, space, matter, etc) was initiated to facilitate God's plan to glorify Himself and save the Elect. God made sure we understood this, yet withholds an exhaustive knowledge of beginning and ending for His own reasons, while graciously allowing us to interact with it to puzzle and humiliate us.

So, I keep coming back to this; if God has not exhaustively revealed this knowledge, how can we enforce discriminatory orthodoxy in these matters?

 

[MW]

So, I keep coming back to this; if God has not exhaustively revealed this knowledge, how can we enforce discriminatory orthodoxy in these matters?

The revelation is itself a space-time reality -- ectypal. Exhaustive or not, it speaks to us in terms we can know. So whatever the terms may mean to God in and of Himself (I'm not one to pry into God's secrets), it must be the case that the time references in this revelation are in terms of human time. In fact, even when Scripture instructs us as to the transcendence of God over time, as in Ps. 90, it does so in terms of human time. We are closed in to the inevitable conclusion that the creation account speaks to us in terms of time as man knows it.

 

[panta dokimazete]

We are closed in to the inevitable conclusion that the creation account speaks to us in terms of time as man knows it.

...but not in terms of God's exhaustive activity within it, not as He does in terms of our faith.

 

[JohnOwen007]

I have not found a theologian or Church Father having to "wrestle" with the Creation account pre Darwin.

Why do you suppose people have so much trouble with it now?

Read Bob Letham's WTJ article (about 1999 or 2000 I think) on how theologians in history (prior to the Englightenment) struggled to know what to do with the creation account.

The assumption that it's only a modern problem is fallacious. If we pay close attention to the text, all sorts of issues arise (like a snake with a personality etc.).

 

[JohnOwen007]

Marty it is clear from Exodus 20 that the days were ordinary days.

Again, that's a huge assumption. When we make reference to one of Jesus' parables we must speak of the the characters in the actual story even though it might not be literally true. Hence, Exodus 20 is simply making reference to the creation account.

To read Genesis 1-3 literally creates more problems than it solves, if we read the text closely. I think the day-age model of Hugh Ross creates more problems than it solves.

I personally take Gen. 1-3 to be like one of Jesus' parables, let's say the Wicked Tennants. It's a story that analogically relates to history. Hence, we can determine how Gen. 1-3 relates analogically to history from the rest of the Bible. For example, Rom. 5:12-21 and 1 Tim. 2:12-15 show us that Adam and Eve were real historical people and there was a real space-time fall. However, we know from the rest of the Bible the Satan is not a talking snake who is moving on his belly and eating dust for the rest of his days.

God bless brother.

 

[bookslover]

If I recall correctly, the OPC has determined that they will allow for other than a literal 6 24-hour-day creation.

True, with the exception of the framework hypothesis view.

 

[MW]

I personally take Gen. 1-3 to be like one of Jesus' parables, let's say the Wicked Tennants.

That's a bold claim to make on a conservative discussion board. I hope you brought your helmet.

Do you suppose all the references in the NT, which describe the events of Gen. 1-3 as historical incidents, to be nothing more than accommodations to the belief of the times?

 

[Narnian]

I see a lot of talking past each other on the thread here as people are raising points that others seem to be ignoring.

For example I believe that Daniel Ritchie has raised a good point about Exodus 20 that raises the question in my mind of what the rest of scripture says about the activities in Genesis (JohnOwen007 I think has attempted to address it but I think it deserves more investigation from a systematic viewpoint).

JohnOwen007 I believe has raised legitimate questions about the creation narrative and whether there are elements that cannot be taken literally that nobody has addressed yet.

Let's put our heads together and look at our hermaneutic. Should all of scripture be taken literally? If not, then what are the guiding principles we should use to determine when it is parable, prose, history or allegory. This, in my mind, is where the real disagreement lays.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I personally take Gen. 1-3 to be like one of Jesus' parables, let's say the Wicked Tennants.

That's a bold claim to make on a conservative discussion board. I hope you brought your helmet.

Do you suppose all the references in the NT, which describe the events of Gen. 1-3 as historical incidents, to be nothing more than accommodations to the belief of the times?

Helmet? You've been hanging around Americans here too long Matthew. Aussies don't need no stinking helmets!

 

[MW]

Helmet? You've been hanging around Americans here too long Matthew. Aussies don't need no stinking helmets!

 

[CDM]

The question of God and time is a complex one, but we should never think God's transcendence of time means He is incapable of operating within it. Notice especially the miracle of the manna. God gave the manna six days of man's week and withheld it on the seventh day. There is no reason to suppose these days were different for God and man. While God's understanding of time infinitely exceeds man's understanding of it, there is nevertheless a corresponding point at which both commune together in real human time and space due to the gracious condescension of God.

I have not found a theologian or Church Father having to "wrestle" with the Creation account pre Darwin.

Why do you suppose people have so much trouble with it now?

Read Bob Letham's WTJ article (about 1999 or 2000 I think) on how theologians in history (prior to the Englightenment) struggled to know what to do with the creation account.

The assumption that it's only a modern problem is fallacious. If we pay close attention to the text, all sorts of issues arise (like a snake with a personality etc.).

I'd like to read the article. Do you have access to it? And were these pre-Enlightenment theologians struggling with the days as we've been discussing?

I don't see how they would or why they would exegetically or philosophically. I mean to say, where in the text would we find something that indicates that the days were not actual 24 hour solar days? We then read how Christ talks about it (NT) and still we find nothing in the text to indicate other than the plain reading.

 

[DMcFadden]

I see a lot of talking past each other on the thread here as people are raising points that others seem to be ignoring.

For example I believe that Daniel Ritchie has raised a good point about Exodus 20 that raises the question in my mind of what the rest of scripture says about the activities in Genesis (JohnOwen007 I think has attempted to address it but I think it deserves more investigation from a systematic viewpoint).

JohnOwen007 I believe has raised legitimate questions about the creation narrative and whether there are elements that cannot be taken literally that nobody has addressed yet.

Let's put our heads together and look at our hermaneutic. Should all of scripture be taken literally? If not, then what are the guiding principles we should use to determine when it is parable, prose, history or allegory. This, in my mind, is where the real disagreement lays.

You are correct that some of us have been raising points that others are ignoring. I have twice referenced a statistical analysis of the verbal patterns in Genesis by a Hebrew scholar that militates AGAINST taking it figuratively. It is not a matter of whether any section of the Bible needs to be interpreted figuratively but was GENESIS 1-11 intended to be interpreted figuratively?

Interpreting "literally" means taking a text in its normal reading according to its genre. A poem is interpreted as poetry and symbolism; a metaphor or similie is taken figuratively; a narrative intends to speak "narratively" or historically. The "literal" method is a cipher for the "historical-grammatical" method.

My postings in this thread so far have referenced the use of "yom" (day) in the Hebrew Bible (considered contextually and in terms of word statistics), the admitted presence of anachronistic language in ALL statements about creation (including those by Big Bangers), the use of Exodus 20:11, and several other points.

Obviously the theological concern of Genesis was not to teach science, it was to affirm that God and God alone created and he did it without the machinations of intermediaries such as recorded in the Babylonian and other near eastern creation myths.

However, that does not mean that we can dismiss the accuracy of its teaching. What we allow in Genesis will come back to bite us in the New Testament. Saying that God really does not mean what he says in Genesis 1 will set you up for some very painful collateral arguments on everything from the role of women to the ordination of gay persons. Get into the habit of allowing that the Bible does not really mean what it says in Genesis in a narrative passage and you will be surprised at how difficult it is to argue with progressives suggesting that it does not mean what it says in Romans 1, or 1 Timothy 2, or even John 14:6.

Having been raised in a mainline denomination, I can remember the assault on Genesis as a child, followed by numerous other issues thereafter. For me and my house, we like the former motto of Answers in Genesis: "Upholding the authority of the Bible from the very first verse."

 

[JohnOwen007]

Marty, if you read the text literally you will notice that it doesn't speak about the sun but the "light bearer." In biblical cosmology the sun is merely a governor of the day, not the "God" of it. God controls the revolution of time, and He does so by alternating light and darkness. The sun, moon, and stars are merely the markers of this alternation. See also the creation hymns of Pss. 19 and 104.

Dear Matthew, to me your explanation shows the problem of the so-called "literal" reading of Gen. 1-3. One starts to move into deep contortions of explanation to keep the ship afloat.

If there is another source of light other than the sun creating a "morning" and an "evening" on the first 3 days, then why is the sun created on the 4th day when this other source of light (not explicitly mentioned in the narrative) was doing precisely that same job? If there was a "morning" and an "evening" at the end of the first day, and we don't have a sun, then we're dealing with a very unique "morning" and "evening", which begs the question whether it can be called a "morning" or an "evening". etc. etc.

God bless you.

 

[JohnOwen007]

I personally take Gen. 1-3 to be like one of Jesus' parables, let's say the Wicked Tennants.

That's a bold claim to make on a conservative discussion board.

I'm only following commentators on Genesis who have a conservative (inerrant) view of Scripture.

I hope you brought your helmet.

I've found a Bible big enough to do the same job ...

Do you suppose all the references in the NT, which describe the events of Gen. 1-3 as historical incidents, to be nothing more than accommodations to the belief of the times?

Which "times" are you referring to, that of the ANE, that of the Graeco-Roman world ... ?

 

[MW]

If there is another source of light other than the sun creating a "morning" and an "evening" on the first 3 days, then why is the sun created on the 4th day when this other source of light (not explicitly mentioned in the narrative) was doing precisely that same job? If there was a "morning" and an "evening" at the end of the first day, and we don't have a sun, then we're dealing with a very unique "morning" and "evening", which begs the question whether it can be called a "morning" or an "evening". etc. etc.

The Scripture explicitly says there were three alternations of "evening and morning" prior to the creation of the heavenly lights, so I am very confident it can indeed be called what Scripture says it was.

 

[MW]

Which "times" are you referring to, that of the ANE, that of the Graeco-Roman world ... ?

The NT times in which the NT was written. When Paul says God commanded light to shine out of darkness, or Peter says the earth stood out of water and in the water, or Paul says He spake in a certain place of the seventh day, or Jesus says the Sabbath was made for man, and elsewhere that God made them male and female at the beginning, or Paul says the serpent beguiled Eve -- in such cases it seems your only line of argument could be that the speakers did not in actual fact believe these things "happened," but merely accommodated their speech to the people they were addressing.

 

[a mere housewife]

Having been mostly a bystander I agree that Mr. McFadden's points about the verbal patterns have been overlooked: I had also understood the specific points raised about the serpent etc. to be dealt with in the more general replies which is probably why they haven't been individually mentioned. For instance, if one doesn't have a problem accepting a natural reading of a literal day theory of creation regardless of science, why should they have a problem accepting a talking snake? (The 'personality' objection seems rather arbitrary? -but I suppose if it's a real difficulty it's simple enough to point out that we aren't told Balaam's donkey was inhabited by an angelic or demonic being.) If I accept a literal reading of other portions of the Old Testament, for instance where God appears to Abraham, why should I have a problem with God appearing in some way to Adam? If I accept that men approach scripture with presuppositions in the present age, why should it be especially problematic that they had (albeit different ones) to deal with in a former? I don't honestly see that such objections pose real problems for interpreting the text as narrative if one really isn't referencing the meaning of the words to a post enlightenment and largely unexamined approach to science, and what it on its own autonomous authority (which doesn't amount to much) tells us is and isn't possible?

 

[JohnOwen007]

Paul says the serpent beguiled Eve

Is Satan a literal Snake? Is Satan, as a snake, now crawling around on his belly eating dust all the days of his life according to God's curse in Gen. 3?

 

[Reformed Covenanter]

That's a bold claim to make on a conservative discussion board. I hope you brought your helmet.

 

[RamistThomist]

Paul says the serpent beguiled Eve

Is Satan a literal Snake? Is Satan, as a snake, now crawling around on his belly eating dust all the days of his life according to God's curse in Gen. 3?

More of a literal dragon than a snake, to be precise.

 

[Reformed Covenanter]

I personally take Gen. 1-3 to be like one of Jesus' parables, let's say the Wicked Tennants.

That's a bold claim to make on a conservative discussion board. I hope you brought your helmet.

Do you suppose all the references in the NT, which describe the events of Gen. 1-3 as historical incidents, to be nothing more than accommodations to the belief of the times?

Helmet? You've been hanging around Americans here too long Matthew. Aussies don't need no stinking helmets!

Actually, like everyone else, they have to wear them when they bat in a cricket match. In light of their recent disputes with the Indians, they may need to wear them a lot more.