Date of creation

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Calculating the date of creation has exercised many minds for hundreds of years.

Basis of calculation

The Bible contains chronogenealogies from Adam to Abraham, listing the age at which each person in the genealogy gave birth to the next person in the list, thus allowing by simple addition a determination of how many years passed between creation and Abraham. There are other chronological indications also, allowing that calculation to be extended into the times of the kings, when the dates can be correlated with other events in history for which the absolute date is known. By this means, in theory, one can calculate the date of creation.

There are, however, some uncertainties in this. For example, Genesis lists the age of Terah when the first of his sons was born, but was Abraham this son, or the second or third son? Different researchers have proposed different answers to this and similar problems, but none of these problems change the result by a very significant amount.

An objection that has often been raised is whether the chronogenealogies were intended to be used this way, or whether, for example, generations have been missed. Henry Morris, a pioneer of modern creationism, allowed for the possibility of gaps in the genealogies, but claimed that it was unreasonable to stretch the date back further than about 10,000 B.C. In more recent times, however, creationists have concluded that there is no reason to think that there are gaps, and this view is supported by the consensus of the experts, according to James Barr, then regius professor of Hebrew at Oxford University, and not a young-Earth creationist (he also wrote a book attacking biblical inerrancy), who wrote in 1984: "… probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1–11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that: … the figures contained in the Genesis genealogies provided by simple addition a chronology from the beginning of the world up to later stages in the biblical story." [1]

Old-earth creationists do not accept this date, proposing that there may be gaps in the genealogies.[2]

Calculated dates

The best known date of creation is the one calculated by Archbishop James Ussher in the 17th century - namely 6:00 p.m. Saturday, October 22, 4004 BC.[3] However, only the year was based on the Biblical ages; the date and time were based on other considerations. Sir Isaac Newton defended Ussher's date.[4] Another to calculate the date of creation was Johannes Kepler, who worked it out to be 3992 B.C.

But such calculations in fact date from at least the Middle Ages, and offer a range of dates from around 5000 to 4000 BC. Judaic tradition reckons the date of creation at 3760 BC. Another calculation, beginning with the date of the destruction of Jerusalem known from secular history and working backwards, arrives at 4163 BC. [5]

Geological dating

Based on geological dating methods and their inherent controversial assumptions, however, secular scientific research dates the formation of the Earth to around 4.5 billion (4.5 * 109) years ago.[6] And according to the Big Bang theory, the universe began even earlier, about 13.7 billion years ago.

Young earth creationist scientists view

Young earth creationist scientists believe that the evolutionary geological timescale is in error. [7][8][9] These scientists believe that the earth is young and has multiple lines of evidence from the field of geology showing that the earth is young. [10][11][12][13][14] Also, young earth creationist scientists assert that there is an abundance of scientific arguments in addition to geology showing the earth and universe are both approximately 6,000 years in age.[15][16][17] In addition, young earth creationist scientists have a number of arguments against the position of an extremely old age for the earth and the universe.[18][19][20][21] Flood geologists also point out that catastrophism is increasingly being accepted in the field of geology. [22] [23] In addition, creationists also assert that old earth uniformitarian geology has numerous anomalies. For example, creationists cite the work of William R. Corliss who catalogued numerous anomalies in the old earth uniformatarian geology paradigm. [24][25] Corliss wrote regarding paraconformities the following:

"Potentially more important to geological thinking are those unconformities that signal large chunks of geological history are missing, even though the strata on either side of the unconformity are perfectly parallel and show no evidence of erosion. Did millions of years fly by with no discernible effect? A possible though controversial inference is that our geological clocks and stratigraphic concepts need working on." William R. Corliss, Unknown Earth (Glen Arm, Maryland: The Sourcebook Project, 1980), p. 219. [26]

The secular science journal New Scientist wrote regarding Corliss's work the following: "All I can say to Corliss is carry on cataloging." [27] Young earth creationist scientists assert that paraconformaties pose a serious challenge to the old earth uniformitarian geology paradigm. [28][29][30]

Notes

  1. ↑ Quoted in Biblical chronogenealogies, by Jonathan Sarfati.
  2. ↑ Are There Gaps in the Biblical Genealogies?, by William Henry Green.
  3. ↑ The Annals of the World, by James Ussher.
  4. ↑ Cited in Sarfati, John, Comets—portents of doom or indicators of youth?, Creation 25(3):36–40, June 2003.
  5. ↑ http://web.newsguy.com/rubyredinger/age.html Biblical age of the Earth
  6. ↑ USGS, Geologic Time: Age of the Earth. Accessed April 18, 2007.
  7. ↑ http://www.trueorigin.org/geocolumn.asp
  8. ↑ http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=view&ID=54
  9. ↑ http://www.allaboutcreation.org/geologic-time-scale.htm
  10. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/geology.asp
  11. ↑ http://www.creationism.org/topbar/geology.htm
  12. ↑ http://www.grisda.org/georpts/gr11.htm
  13. ↑ http://www.nwcreation.net/geologylinks.html
  14. ↑ http://globalflood.org/
  15. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/young.asp
  16. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/astronomy.asp
  17. ↑ http://www.icr.org/article/1842/
  18. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/dating.asp
  19. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/astronomy.asp
  20. ↑ http://www.apologeticspress.org/modules.php?name=Read&cat=1&itemid=22
  21. ↑ http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2002/0809_cdk_davies.asp
  22. ↑ http://www.grisda.org/origins/12061.htm
  23. ↑ http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=print&ID=84
  24. ↑ http://www.science-frontiers.com/sourcebk.htm
  25. ↑ http://www.apologeticspress.net/articles/184
  26. ↑ http://www.cs.unc.edu/~plaisted/ce/flood.html
  27. ↑ http://www.science-frontiers.com/sourcebk.htm
  28. ↑ http://www.grisda.org/georpts/36.pdf
  29. ↑ http://www.grisda.org/2003-FSC-open/Roth-RecentCreation.htm
  30. ↑ http://www.seeking-god.co.uk/id188.htm
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