Summary Point # 16

This view of Genesis [young biosphere creationism] can accommodate a short or long period of time before the first day. Where the Bible remains silent, we may cautiously look to science and make our guesses. In any case, we must glorify God as Lord of the vastness of time as well as the vastness of space. But no room can be allowed for biological development during the vast time period. The biology and dry land geology of our earth is recent--less than 8,000 years old.

Summary Point # 15

The ex nihilo creation of the universe is not a suitable example for men to imitate in their weekly work pattern, because men cannot create anything ex nihilo. Therefore, it is reasonable that God's six-day example was limited to "making" or working on preexisting materials--like man does in his daily labor.

This work, on the already existing planet, is recorded for us beginning with the first earth day. Exodus 20:11 does not refer to anything that God created ex nihilo before there were any earth days, namely the universe of stars, planets, and angels. The fourth commandment is not even primarily a passage on origins. It is much wiser to build a cosmogony from passages specifically centering on that subject.

Summary Point # 14

The words "heaven" and "earth" are each defined in two ways in Genesis, one of which is specified by God Himself during the six-day activity as atmosphere and continental land. Therefore, the definitions assigned during those six days must modify the passage in Exodus when referencing the very same six days. This is basic hermeneutics 101 or if there is a "grade school" hermeneutics it would be centrally emphasized there. Exodus 20:11 refers only to the work of the six-day period which pertained to earth's air, land, and sea for "work" is the setting of the fourth commandment. The "uninhabited and empty" earth was being "filled" with biological life. To apply Exodus 20:11 to the stellar heavens violates the context, for it has nothing to do with the original creation of sun, moon and stars, completed in verse one, but only the "work" of the following six days. Air and land, having been defined by God Himself during those referenced six days, simply leaves us with no other option.

Summary Point # 13

All the "days" of Genesis were literal, solar time periods. God cited the six days [Gen. 1:1-31], followed by a Sabbath [Gen. 2:1-3], as an example for man to work and rest. The Hebrew asah when translated, "worked on," "brought forth," "established" or "did" in the origins passages [1:7,16...], better reflects the meaning of the Hebrew word in that context.

Halley and Northrup

Re: August 31 posting.

Thanks, John, for the references to people who held my view before me. I also remember when writing the Age of the Universe book making a deliberate decision to avoid the commentaries and expositions until after I had absorbed the Scripture for myself. So I depend on good friends like you to do research for me "after the fact."

 

(Age of the Universe, Page 82) Some say, "Your interpretation is new. The church has never understood it this way," My answer is "No, it is not new. True, it has not been widely known and several sources supply only pieces of the whole, but consider. Would anyone guess the argument of this chapter before satellite exploration? Hardly. Similarly, would the early or medieval church concern themselves with galactic distances and the speed of light before Roemer measured it in 1676? I insist that one need not know the facts of astronomy to conclude the interpretation offered here. Job 38 was here from antiquity and all the arguments presented are valid for any time period. I have not concerned myself with the history of relevant interpretations but I will mention the well known commentary of Jamieson, Faussett and Brown,which (in part) supports my thesis. Similarly, Halley's Bible Handbook (Zondervan, Grand Rapids, MI 1962 pages 59-61) states regarding the fourth day:

"On the "first day" (light from sun, moon and stars) must have penetrated the earth's mists (1:3) while they themselves were not visible. But now, (on the fourth day) due to the lessening density of the clouds,... they became visible on earth."

Probably hidden away in some dusty volume is the entire thing in one piece, like scrolls found in pottery in an archaeology site.

 

(And from page 179) Following are quotations from Dr. Northrup which are listed below for the following purpose: It should be significant that the conclusions I have presented in various papers since 1985 or so and verbally for decades before that, were arrived at completely independently from Dr. Northrup even though they sound so similar. My suspicion is that numerous people who do not publish at all but who have examined the text have also come to the same conclusions. No one has a patent on Bible interpretation. Halley's handbook has a brief explanation which has some differences but again is similar. I include Dr. Northrup's interpretation to show how independent students can come to precisely the same conclusions from a search of the Scripture without the slightest knowledge one of the other. This is important for it shows that the truth was there, available to each without derivation from a common source other than the Bible itself. It is also encouraging that I, with a careful use of prayer, lexicons, dictionaries and other tools available to any student but with zero knowledge of Hebrew, can derive the same conclusion as he, an expert in the original languages. This should encourage other students to "search the Scriptures" which is the privilege of every believer even without academic letters. I have referred to Dr. Northrup earlier within this text (see pages 54 and 73).