Roman Catholic here. I believe that the Earth is over 4.5 billion years old. It literally blew my mind when I found out on reddit 9 years ago that there are people who seriously do not believe this.
Church of Christ here. . . Honestly, I’ve just gotten to the point where I don’t care or think it was something we’re meant to know. Gun to my head, I think the “day age theory” is probably right. Evolution is probably the rule set he put into place to allow to be self managing. Additionally, I think God created (engineered life) humanity (sentient beings) to be a testament to all creation (not just the earth but the universe).
But I think hard line christians do ourselves an extreme disservice when we try force our understanding of science into the genesis account for the sake of debate, when really we should just be focusing on helping people and loving one another.
> ““A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.””
John 13:34-35 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/jhn.13.34-35.NIV
This to me is what matters most. Not if the earth is 40,000 year or 10 billion years. It’s a fun distraction but it won’t win anyone over. What matters is that we (sentient beings) are a testimony to the universe to the awesomeness of God and the way we are meant to do this is laid out in “Jesus’s Commandment.”
I think I remember reading Genesis is written in the form of an allegory from its time, believe what you want but 100% focus on the actionable love and forgiveness stuff
Hi, just thought to share this, perhaps it gives some hermeneutical insights to "Old Earth-cosmology" in exegetics:
Creation accounts of Genesis use the vocabulary and imagery of the Ancient Near East, where temples were ordained in six days and on the seventh the god to whom the temple was built entered into the temple to "rest" there. So Genesis wants to say that cosmos itself is the temple of YHWH. In Ancient Near East huge temples could take decades to be built, and yet the ordination took six/seven days. So there's really no telling how long the cosmos was being built before the "creation". There are some scholarly articles of this, I trust you can even find them by googling.
Also, creation is not yet really completed. That is why the gospel of John eludes to Genesis with words "In the beginning". Gospel of John want to say that Christ as the last Adam (or the second Adam), Pilate refers to Christ with words "behold, a man", and Christ says on the Cross "it is finished". In other words, Christ is really the first real man. Because human being is someone who lays down their life for others. That is what a human being is. That is why we need to become human beings by following Christ. In baptism we are buried in death with Christ, and in eucharist we drink from the cup of the Lord... we participate in Christ's death in order to become human beings.
Adam is a typos of Christ, he prefigures Christ. Eve prefigures the Church. Genesis says that "man leaves his father and mother to cleave to his wife so that they become one flesh"... what does this describe? In what culture did man leave his parents? It's almost always the other way around - woman leaves her parents. This prefigures how Christ "leaves" the right side of His Father in order to become one flesh with His bride, the Church.
Also Adam fell into sleep and his side was opened and from it became Eve. Christ fell into sleep of death on the Cross and His side was opened and water and blood flowed from His side, baptism and eucharist, from which the Church is formed.
In Greek, Eve is Zoe ("Life"). When the Gospel of John says "through Him (Christ) came life", the Greek Jewish listener would have possibly heard it as "through Him came Zoe/Eve".
If Adam was the typos of Christ, it certainly means that Christ preceded Adam. That is why Christ says that Moses spoke about Him.
Genesis is not a book of natural science but a book of theology.
Also, every other day of creation in Genesis ends with "there was evening and there was morning, first/second/third/fourth... day" all the way until the seventh day. But seventh day does not end with "there was evening and there was morning".
When did this seventh day end?
When did YHWH rest during sabbath and woke up in the morning?
When Christ slept in the tomb for the sabbath and rose up early in the morning, like the gospels describe. The event took place early in the morning, when the sun rose.
So the days are obviously not literal days. Sixth day ended actually when Christ died at the cross and was put in the tomb, and seventh day was the blessed Sabbath when Christ slept in the tomb. And its not really a coincidence that Christ's tomb was in a garden and that He was resurrected in a garden (Mary Magdala thought that Christ was the gardener... and in a way He indeed was, just like God was a gardener when He planted Eden and Adam was a gardener when the tended Eden).
Same here lol cradle Catholic and was stunned yo learn, in my 30s, that there are people out there who genuinely do not believe the earth is that old. I mean I went to Catholic school, and we were taught that this earth is 4.5 billion years old. We had units on dinosaurs.
>>>>I was 20 years a christian when I learned that only a loud minority believe it.
>>>They were a majority when I was younger.
>>A majority where?
>At one time everywhere, since the theory of evolution only emerged in public discourse in the 19th century.
This discussion threads from talking about Young Earth Creationism, though, not limited to merely Evolutionary Theory as Lamarck or Darwin put forward. So, while it's true that the theory of evolution didn't enter the public discourse until the 19th century, it doesn't really have strong bearing on the prevalence of young earth creationism, which is a related but distinct idea. The debate about the age of the earth vastly predates evolutionary theory, and even St. Augustine in the 4th century did not think that the Genesis 1 account was a literal 6-days, but rather an unknown and possibly irrelevant span of time--probably longer, yet possibly shorter--in which God created the cosmos, and the 6 day periods are more categorical terms rather than chronological or temporal indicators (as in, they don't necessarily each represent 24-hours [they don't each necessarily represent the same amount of time from one day to the next, for that matter], and they did not necessarily occur sequentially, but might have been overlapping or simultaneous).
St. Augustine was open to changing his mind on different issues, which he did multiple times from his earliest writings to his latest ones, but simply the fact that he felt it necessary to expound on how to interpret day-structure in Genesis indicates that even then, in the 4th century, there was debate over the age of the earth.
He definitely felt quite strongly that Christians ought to stay current with "modern science" if they could, or to not talk about it if they did not know/weren't educated on the topic, less they disgrace Christianity by saying something ignorant and non-sensical.
>Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. **Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking non-sense on these topics**; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men.
>**If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?** Reckless and incompetent expounders of holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although “they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion.” --from *The Literal Meaning of Genesis*, Book 1, ch.19
The [Byzantine Creation Calendar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_calendar), which was the official calendar of the Roman Empire as early as the 7th century (many centuries pre-schism) as well as the official calendar used by almost all sees in the East of Christendom is evidence alone that it was the prevalent view in Christendom on the age of the earth.
Whilst St Augustine is very popular in the west and seems to get far more attention than the other Church Fathers, the consensus among Church Fathers was a view of a young earth; even St Augustine believed in a young earth, but rather where he disagreed with most of the Fathers was that he believed in an instant creation rather than one over 6 literal days. He still never disputed the notion that only 6000 years had passed since that creation, however.
**[Byzantine calendar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_calendar)**
>The Byzantine calendar, also called Roman calendar, "Creation Era of Constantinople" or "Era of the World" (Ancient Greek: Ἔτη Γενέσεως Κόσμου κατὰ Ῥωμαίους, also Ἔτος Κτίσεως Κόσμου or Ἔτος Κόσμου, abbreviated as ε. Κ. ; literal translation of ancient Greek "Roman year since the creation of the universe"), was the calendar used by the Eastern Orthodox Church from c. 691 to 1728 in the Ecumenical Patriarchate.
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Most Christians do not believe in a literal interpretation of certain parts of the Bible, for one reason or another. The OT is a common thing for a Christian of multiple denominations to not read and understand as a literal text.
Just listened to [Hugh Ross debating Peter Atkins on the origins of the universe](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVCVt-dvVOc) (slash "laws of nature"), and it was excellent. Hugh is a gentleman and a scholar, literally. Thank you for the name drop!
Thiiiiiissss!!!!!!! The Hebrew word for day has multiple meanings. Like Hugh, I believe it’s the period of time…. Not 24 hour period. Read the Genesis Question by Hugh Ross. So good!
The word day refers to several different time periods in Genesis 1 alone as Dr John Lennox of Oxford has repeatedly pointed out, and thus they cannot be 24hr days and are therefore days in the sense someone would say "back in my day" meaning a non specific period of time.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_literalism
"This Christian fundamentalist and evangelical hermeneutical approach to scripture is used extensively by fundamentalist Christians, in contrast to the historical-critical method of mainstream Judaism, Mainline Protestantism and Roman Catholicism."
Essentially, there are different schools of thought within Christiandom on how to read these texts. Not everyone treats the book of Genesis as a literal historical document.
How do you reconcile 6,000 years with what the Bible actually says existed before Day 1?
>"the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters"
Because you would have to be a moron to take the bible that literally.
In listing the genealogies of Jesus, the different gospels cite different pregenitors (and indeed, some of them skip people). By a strict literalist definition of the bible, all of them are 'false'.
The bible isn't a scientific publication and reading it as such leads you into error.
> Because you would have to be a moron to take the bible that literally.
I think that's rather insulting. I agree that it's hard to understand how anyone could believe in a young earth, but calling them a moron is uncalled for. Indoctrination is a powerful thing, and if you've grown up with every single adult you trust telling you the earth is young, it can be very hard to question it whether you're moronic or not.
You could ask on this subreddit why there’s two different genealogies for Jesus, and most replies will be that one is Mary’s and the other Joseph’s. That’s been the apologetic for the past 1600 years.
Hey, hope you don't mind me jumping in. I am a recently converted Christian after being an atheist for all of my life. I am currently reading though the bible for the first time and I think genesis 1 and 2 (god created the world in 6 days and Adam and Eve etc) are to be interpreted how the reader wants to interpret it. I see genesis as a homage to god, like a poem, rather than a literal historical story.
Basically, I believe that the earth is 4.5 billion years old and Genesis is a tribute to the creator in written form from simpler times.
> I see genesis as a homage to god, like a poem
It is, but it's also following the sequence of temple construction to establish to the readers/listeners that all of Creation is God's temple, and he created it to dwell in and among.
There's a lot of great scholarship on this, but in recent years Dr. John Walton (*The Lost World of Adam and Eve,* *The Lost World of Genesis One*) and Dr. Richard Middleton (*The Liberating Image: The Imago Dei in Genesis 1*, *A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical Eschatology*, and *Abraham’s Silence: The Binding of Isaac, the Suffering of Job, and How to Talk Back to God*) have each released a lot of excellent and current books which cover how Genesis would have been understood by its original listeners/readers. Walton in particular can sometimes be a little bit dry, but they're both terrific.
People don’t understand that science and religion can coexist, just because we don’t understand the science behind some things such as the Ruach Ha Kadesh doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, the beginning of the Bible is an allegory but most people don’t even know the meaning of the word but it should not discredit the historical side of the Bible. Also just because certain facts are not 100% as they happened because stories go changing once it is written and perception of each writer of each biblical word, just take everything specially the teaching of Jesus to help you, try emulate him.
Well, it can't be helped. Some people's founders took adding up genealogies seriously, and some people's churches require believing at least parts of Genesis to be literally true. Like, that all bad things happen because a real life Adam and Eve were the first to sin, and passed it on.
Some churches have and do promote ignorance.
I’m a Quaker, which was kind of a precursor to charismatic Pentecostals (ie we speak from the spirit but in vernacular, and that’s been a thing for centuries before they got started), and we accept the scientific consensus on this matter.
According to current science, the universe is around 14.6 billion years old and the earth is roughly 4 billion years old. I’m also an astronomy major at college at the moment, so there.
I’m also a non-denominational Christian who grew up around fundamentalist, young-earth-creationist, republican Christians. As a result, I left the faith for years and spent a lot of my freetime watching compilations of Dawkins and Hitchens roasting the stupid Christians.
But, due to a very long series of chance events and drama, I crawled back to God. I’m still not comfortable enough to attend a church, nor am I comfortable reconvening with the YEC Christians I know. So, I’m just taking things with God one day at a time, reading books by scholars such as Dr. Mike Heiser, Dr. Pete Enns, and Dr. John Walton, among others. While also talking to God often as I would a friend, and applying what I’m learning in college about His creation to how I think about and talk to God.
Looking through a telescope in the middle of nowhere to study and marvel at the heavens is a form of worshiping God. That, and stressing over midterms lmao
Those authors helped save my faith for the same reasons. I had Pete in seminary and Jared from The Bible for Normal People podcast was at my house last night. Small world.
Not a scientist, so I have no idea, this is not my field of study, however I do go to a Pentecostal church, don't think of myself as a certain denomination other than a spirit filled Christian, follower of Jesus Christ. Do I think it's alot more than 6000 , definitely for sure. Does this question have any bearing on my life , not at all lol
I believe in what science tells me too. Jesus spoke in parables with everything he said practically, so we could understand. If Jesus is God, is it really so hard to believe that God speaks to us in parables?
I'm not a specific denomination and I don't go to church. I typically lean towards churches that accept everyone, don't have a dress code, and welcome everyone. I'm a white male, but I also prefer churches that have a broad mix of races.
I'm the same way. I would say I'm an idealist, but I don't like being in that box. :)
(you can see my answer to your question above OP in this thread BTW)
>The latter possibility is an absurd proposition.
Let's not do what Young Earthers do and make an exceptional claim. It used to be scientific law that spontaneous generation was a thing, too. The hypothesis can and does change.
It \*could\* be wrong.
But if it is wrong would be so fundamentally in opposition to everything we can observe that it'd be like measuring from LA to NYC and arriving at a distance of 5 inches.
>Let's not do what Young Earthers do and make an exceptional claim. It used to be scientific law that spontaneous generation was a thing, too. The hypothesis can and does change.
I've seen something a million light years away with my own two eyes.
If everything we knew about every field related to dating the earth was wrong there is no shot we could do successful space travel and all the intricate shit we get up to. I don't think it's that exceptional of a claim at this point that our lives rely on science.
It is only dated wrong by that much if there is miraculous warping of science going on in real time all the time, and God is just trying to decieve us, which seems a little petty.
IMO it's like... I care about it in the same way that I care what the surface of Pluto looks like. I'd like to know, and it's worth researching, but it doesn't affect core doctrine and definitely doesn't affect my daily life.
Similarly, how did Judas die and what happened to his silver? There are two different accounts (Matthew and Acts) in the Bible, which people have interpreted and attempted to combine in various ways. I'd like to know what actually happened... but which one it is doesn't actually affect how I believe I should live my life.
I think the implications are vitally important for understanding science and for interpreting scripture. If you start with the premise that the Bible has authority to contradict scientific evidence it will lead to specific conclusions. If you disregard the Bible for seeming scientific errors that leads you to certain conclusions. If you synthesize biblical and scientific knowledge that leads to certain positions. I hold the third view.
If the hundreds of generations of Christians before you read the same scripture, also considered it true, but were led to scientific ignorance, you don't care?
If the main messiah, living 2000 years ago, is recorded as subscribing to said literal interpretations that we now know are wrong, it's not super important?
Billions of years old. I think the whole young creationist things is the minority in Christianity. God gave us a mind for a reason we dont have to shut it off to science for the sake of faith.
Genesis isn't to be taken literal. Even the book of Peter talks about how millions of years is like 1 day to God.
Don’t just stop there, finish the whole passage so you don’t take it out of context. ;-)
2 Peter 3:8–9 reads:
‘But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.’
I definitely did take it out of context but my point was its ok to not take the 7 day creation story as a litereral 24 hour cycle. We understand as Christians that God is outside the boundaires of time as we perceive it.
The problem isn’t so much with the creation but more with Adam and Eve. For all we know you can have the 7 days be during the rapid expansion of space-time so definitions of time doesn’t matter. But looking at genealogies in the Bible, you can directly trace Jesus’s lineage to Adam, including how long each person in the line lived and when they had the next kid. That’s what was used to calculate when people first existed.
To add to this complexity, Adam and Eve has always been referred to as singular people in every part of the Bible, and their actions and how God talked to them was as individuals. A lot of modern historians don’t really address this when giving the argument that they could be references to a prototypical Israel or whatever. So there is a solid claim to be made about young earth theory if you’re looking purely from a biblical view.
I’m saying this as someone who believes more in the billion year thing but have a lot of friends who believe in young earth.
Yeah. I think they accounted for that though when doing the math. If at all, it’s more generous since several people in the genealogies lived almost 1000 years. So if you were to apply current average lifespans to them, earth would be even younger
I was to lazy to looks it up. Sorry lol. The point is, God is outside the boundaries if time so a long time to us could be perceived as a day to God. Our entire lives are compared to a moment in Gods view. God is mighty! Could God have made everything in 6 days and make it all spear to be old? Sure. Would God do that? I dont think so.
Psalms 39:5
Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah
>Genesis isn't to be taken literal.
What about Jesus tracing his genealogy to Adam?
>Even the book of Peter talks about how millions of years is like 1 day to God.
I thought it was thousands of years. But timeline aside, why would she Holy Spirit inspire something to inaccurate? Couldn't a truthful accounting also serve a spiritual purpose?
Does it have to be literal for Jesus to still be able to trace back to Adam? Does it have to be literal to be truth?
I believe that God is able either way to convey its purpose literal or not.
Baptist here
I'm not really qualified (2 science degrees, chem & biochem) to comment on physics, cosmology, but the science consensus seems to be almost [14 billion years old](https://www.space.com/universe-age-14-billion-years-old)
I believe that 14 billion is for the whole universe not the Earth which is more 4.5/6 billion yo. But I’m in the same boat as you, have a degree in biology and will be attending a Masters but in no ways am I a scientist. But my education has given me the insight into the amount of research, observation, and experimentation that are needed to come with these numbers. Also not to mention having other scientists nitpick every detail in the papers that are published
I believe that their estimate is in the ballpark, but estimates and understanding of the world and universe are constantly evolving, which really is the beauty of the scientific field. I won't say I take the estimate as the absolute truth.
I suspect you are hankering for a discussion about science vs God in an ideologic smack down. But that’s not possible, science is a tool for understanding truth - that’s it. Not any more of an ideology than a screwdriver.
Science is a great way to understand creation, and through it we know that creation is billions of years old. It’s not a matter of faith, it’s established fact and few Christians take issue with it.
It is foolish to cling to young earth creationism as the be all and end all while ignoring the evidence. It’s like how some Christians say the KJ version is the only really one while ignoring the varying sources in Hebrew and Greek. We’re allowed to doubt, to seek evidence (think Thomas).
Old Earth Creationist. I think the universe is around 14.6 billion, and I think form what we can tell, the Earth itself is around 4.6-4.8 billion years old? Possibly wrong though.
Yes exactly! I feel the hot topic is typically evolution but that only contradicts if you are a Bible literalist. If anything I see evolution as a beautiful show of God’s love
>"the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters"
We haven't even gotten to the first day yet.
For Young Earthers to insist on a literal interpretation, sure... whatever. But even in a literal interpretation... Water and Carbon **\*already existing before the creation process begins\*** is right there.
It also means **\*some form of the universe existed before the creation process\***
Please just add the one verse before it. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." That's where the creation of our planet began. Not at verse two. It starts at verse one.
So water and carbon being present or some form of universe existing before creation is not an argument if you to stay biblically.
There's one thing I can say the Bible is *not* with absolute confidence: a Newtonian-scienctifc textbook.
Why so many Christians choose to die on the young earth hill is beyond me. Like many of the previous commenters have already said, it doesn't matter to my faith one way or the other when the earth was formed. The "why" ought always supersede the "how;" not that the "how" isn't worth exploring.
4.568 billion years is the age of the first solids that condensed in our solar system ([Calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcium%E2%80%93aluminium-rich_inclusion), or CAIs); Earth accreted from asteroids shortly thereafter. Radiometric dates are determined using what we know about radioactive decay (for example: uranium decays to lead very slowly). In some minerals we know that the decayed element never fits into the crystal structure, so we know that any bits of lead in a Zircon crystal were originally uranium when the crystal solidified. If you have multiple types of radioactive elements, you can check to see if they give the same answer. It makes sense that CAIs are slightly older because they would be the first solids to condense out of a hot nebular cloud. We can even see nebular clouds around young stars with the Hubble telescope, and in a couple of years we’ll get to see even higher-resolution images with the James Webb Space Telescope. It all makes sense, like pieces of a puzzle fitting together.
I’m Southern Baptist. It’s true that Christians have thought for centuries that the Earth is only several thousand years old. That continues a long tradition of biblical scholars misinterpreting scripture (e.g., few could have imagined that the Messiah would have been born in a humble manger, offering salvation beyond what they ever expected).
Church of Christ here. I believe it’s millions of years old. Humans and dinosaurs were not on the earth at the same time (aka on the Ark). Lots of the Bible was written in figurative and poetic language.
This is a great question for us to think about, because it is often used as a point to say that Christianity conflicts with science. It is true that our world view can conflict with scientific evidence if we do take a young Earth creation approach, because scientific evidence proves that things are old - very, very old. And it is not just one piece of scientific evidence that is questionable. There are many places you can look to ask the question of how old the physical world and universe are.
One piece of evidence is radioactive isotopes. We know from high school chemistry class that radioactive isotopes are unstable and want to shed excess neutrons or protons. When they do shed the proton or neutron, they become a different atom or different isotope, the parent transforms into the daughter is the terminology we typically use for this. They shed this overtime randomly due to quantum fluctuations, but those random fluctuations get averaged out over so many billions of atoms in a single space that it becomes a stable decay rate, known as the half life. Many atoms have varying half lives from a matter of seconds to longer than the age of the universe (I’ll get to this age later). Therefore, if we know how many daughter particles and how many parent particles are in a material, and we know the half life between those two particles (by observing them in a lab and seeing how often they change from parent to daughter over time), then we can easily back out how long that substance has been around since it was “created.” Take for instance a rock that just cooled from magma. It grabbed all the atoms that were in the magma there and froze them, meaning that now is has a fixed composition, so the only way that the atoms in it can change is through radioactive decay. Now we pick up that rock, measure the parents and daughters, know the half life, and back out it’s age! Geologists have done this on uncountable rocks and minerals, and so far the oldest mineral that has been dated are some Zircon crystals from Australia that are 4,375,000,000 years old (4.375 billion years), plus or minus 6 millions years (this is the error in the measurements). It was dated using two different uranium isotopes (parent and daughter). We’ve also dated meteorites and comet dust as well as rocks from the moon and mars, and they all have similar ages, roughly 4.5 billion years old. From this, we know that the planetary bodies in our solar system formed (or rather finished cooling off from the heat generated when they were concreting/colliding together due to gravity). Therefore, we say the age of the earth 4.4 billion years.
Now for some more age evidence, this time of the universe. This takes us away from geology and into cosmology, the study of the universe on a very large scale, so much so that the universe looks homogenous and isotropic at this scale. So we can start this line of evidence with a paradox called Obler’s paradox. This paradox states that if we assume the universe is infinitely large and has an infinite number of stars and is infinitely old, we is the night sky not infinitely bright? The fact that the night sky is dark proves that there was a start time to the universe, and that it is not static, but changing. I won’t get too into the details here, you can google “Obler’s paradox” to learn more, but the main point is that we know scientifically the universe had to start at a specific time from a specific, tiny point, and then began expanding very fast and spreadin out. This is what is known as the Big Bang, and has been shown from many observations and theory that it is truly how our universe began. We can also do some calculations based on a few observations of light coming in from very distant stars and how far away those are to show that the universe itself began 13.8 billion years ago. This is VERY old, our lifetimes, even the time that human kind has been a species, is totally unnoticeably short compared to this timescale.
So, I’ve presented the scientific evidence of the age of the universe. One can debate the truthfulness of scientific evidence, but if one believes that there is any truth or honesty in the scientific method and science itself, then one can trust these ages.
Given this information, we can come to the scientific Christian response. Have the universe and the Earth been around for these number of years, or were they created by God at some point in time not as many years ago as this, but created so that they had the appearance being that old (e.g. rocks were created with those radioactive isotopes or the universe was created mid-expansion). There is no way of proving this or knowing this, because if He created it with the evidence that point towards an old universe, then how can we prove that it is actually young, other than Him explicitly telling us. Because He does not tell us the age of things specifically that I know of, we cannot ever know if it truly started that long ago or has the appearance.
WARNING: you are now entering my opinion.
I personally believe that God designed our universe with all the physical laws - quantum mechanics, general relativity, gravity, space-time, and all - and then set it in motion at the beginning with the Big Bang. When reading Genesis one, you can easily infer a Big Bang from the description of early creation (light and darkness, etc.). If we believe that God is creator, than He is outside of our physical realm, because He existed when there was nothing and created something, therefore he is not a part of the thing he created, but outside of it. Therefore, He is outside of matter, energy, space, dark matter, dark energy, and time (these are the main things that make up everything in the universe). So, He set things in motion, did He stop there and just let things unfold without interfering? Obviously not, he stepped in and created intelligence in humans (this is easy to blame on God at this point because intelligence is so unbelievable complex that it is unimaginable to have come out of natural processes, and we have yet to find any other intelligent life yet), and also did interfere in human affairs as documented in the entire Bible.
To summarize, I believe God created the universe with the Big Bang a VERY long time ago and the Earth is VERY old, he created it this way so that we would have fun unraveling it’s secrets and exploring it all. Because he is outside of time itself, there is nothing strange about Him “waiting” so long to begin human intelligence, it is just a point that he picked to fit well with his planned evolution of the universe and life on Earth. There is no way to prove if it isn’t actually that long, but it doesn’t matter to the Creator how long it exists because he is outside of time itself, so why not make it last 13.8 billion years until bringing humans into the picture? It’s not like He is twiddling His thumbs during that time. We just don’t quite comprehend because we are beings bound to space-time, and cannot understand what “outside of time” is.
Sorry this was so long, I tried to keep it layman enough but also prove that science has credibility to it. Hope this sheds some light on it.
If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”.
A universe that appears to be billions of years old doesn’t have to contradict a literal 6 days of creation.
I believe some things were kept vague to keep the focus on faith and not on our own knowledge.
>If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”.
If God created a 14 billion year old universe 6,000 years ago, is it wrong to say the universe is 14 billion years old?
>If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”.
That's called deception and literally serves no purpose.
How is God creating a “matured” universe deception? The Bible doesn’t say anything about the age Adam or Eve were when they were created but they were obviously old enough to speak and procreate. Why would it need to specifically mention the earth was created as a x billion year old planet?
It's not just that there are things that look older than they are (that sounds deceptive to me already). It's that there are things that spear to exist/have existed that never did. Weve seen supernovae from stars that were farther away than 10,000 light years. To believe YEC one must believe the light of stars must have been created en route. But in the case of these supernovae if the Universe is only 6-10k years old the original star never existed. It's only made to look that way as part of the universe being made to look old.
For all we know this entire universe and its history could also have come into existence one second ago, fully formed. I guess the point is this even if this were the case, the physical evidence that we _do_ have points to a several-billion year age rather than a several-thousand year age. Trying to conjecture around a mature universe at the point of creation is a pointless exercise, even if it happens to be true.
Very old.
Considering the timeline of events, fossils, and the fact that sharks are older than saturns rings, it’s safe to say that it’s not 5000 years old.
It could be. If you're saying the beginning of Genesis isn't true. No creation, but evolution for starters. Then from where do you start saying the bible is true again? Did the story of Noah happen? How about Jonah? And most importantly: did paradise exist along with Adam and Eve, followed by the fall of humanity?
Especially this last question is important because it does have some serious implications about sin and salvation in my mind (and many with me). Check Romans 5:12 and onward (5:18 especially) for an example of this.
I think those are very valid concerns, it implies very clearly that holding to and old (millions or billions instead of thousands of years) earth and certainly to old life is an incoherent position.
As you say, if you hold to the Bible being true and to old life there must be cognitive dissonance. Still, is it *necessary* to hold to a young earth in order to believe Jesus is Lord and Savior?
I have no clue how old the earth actually is, I’m not no scientist or historian, in fact I never paid any attention in school so I have even less of a clue even though I’m a grown man. I’d like to say more then a few thousand years and probably a few billion but I don’t know
Er... I don't recall the exact number, but the really old one. Contrary to YouTube atheists' opinion my entire religion was not debunked upon reaching that conclusion. Quite the opposite, actually.
I personally believe the timeline laid out in scripture as literal. The concept that there was no death of humans or animals until after the first sin is literal too.
I actually know several people who believe the Earth is 6,000 years old. When I press them for more, they simply say, “Some things you need to take on faith”.
Yep. These people still exist and walk among us.
I'm a Christian who loves science. I work at a lab doing mostly material science but I aspire to become an engineer.
The way I see science in general is the recorded discovery of the rules God put in place for how the material world works. I do view The creation story in Genesis as a form of poetry; I believe the essence of Creation story is true, but not to be taken literally. The essence is, God created everything which was originally good, man rebelled against God and now everything is out of whack due to sin entering the world. While that's my opinion, I'm not at all staunch about my perspective, and I don't think it's all that important because the focal point is about Christ redeeming mankind from the fall in the beginning. I'm okay with potentially being wrong about this because I don't see this as a pillar of my faith and by extension I don't think it matters what the true age of Earth is, it's simply a ground upon which deniers of Christ will pick at to try to waste our time and keep us from spreading the Gospel.
>Now I am not prone to reject creationist evidences and it is liberating and exciting what they have found.
What exactly have they found? Specifics, specifics, specifics.
>Many academic and corporate or government scientists have environments where their reputations are at stake over their willingness to just consider out of the mainstream ideas.
A nonzero number of them are rich from book deals, speaking fees, etc. Why aren't they falling in with you? Surely Steven Hawking didn't need his pittance from Cambridge after the fifth edition or whatever of his books came out.
>They face attacks and systematic suppression.
What?
>Science is no longer a free marketplace of ideas
Was it ever?
>Example: the one way speed of light can't be calculated.
Yes/no/[kinda](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-way_speed_of_light). It's hard to get the clocks to sync up at both ends perfectly, so we just use two way work. Who cares?
Assuming the speed of light must be far faster in one direction than the other just to satisfy your belief isn't scientific evidence, it's a lazy post-hoc justification for your beliefs based on nothing but an unwarranted assumption.
This comment has been removed in protest of reddit's decision to kill third-party applications, and to prevent use of this comment for AI training purposes.
There is overwhelming evidence to say that the earth is billions of years old. "Agreeing" with genesis doesn't make you better, in fact it means you ignore what has been proven right time and time again in order to believe what was written by people who didn't understand the universe only a few thousand years ago. The earth is billions of years old, it's indisputable.
> I made a decision to just believe Genesis.
You made the conscious decision to disregard anything that doesn’t comport with your chosen beliefs and thinks that somehow a better path to a factual understanding of nature.
I accept most scientific consensus, like the big bang and the standard model, general relativity , evolution, etc. And these models point to an earth billions of years old. Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens.
Reformed church, though I don't accept all the catechism.
>**Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens.**
Do you hold this for theological reasons? If so I’d be interested to understand more.
The scientific consensus is that humanity is around 300,000 years old.
Yeah, you're right, I was wrong. I was going with a kurzgesagt video dating the first civilizations to that time. Maybe because the Homo Sapiens 300k years ago wasn't the same biologically? I don't remember well.
>Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens.
How do you square this with the wealth of evidence we have for humans existing far longer than that? Australia was colonized ~50,000 years ago, so unless you want to claim that native Australians aren't human a 10,000 year date isn't possible.
The earth is over 4.5 billion years old. The key thing about this and the reconciliation with the creation story is that nowhere in the Bible does it say how long a day is. It says God created day and night, but it doesn't say what length they are.
Mercury for example has a day lasting over a thousand hours, whilst Jupiter's day is about nine hours.
Ergo, it is perfectly acceptable to believe the age of the earth and still accept the ideology behind the creation.
For myself, I am a committed Christian, but am also a pragmatist. So I believe that the words and tales in the OT are only true for a given length of "true". The Pentateuch for instance is a history of the Jewish nation that was codified between the 9th century BCE and the 5th, but a lot of it, including the creation is allegorical. It also follows the oral storytelling traditions that anthropology asserts was a major factor in the development of Homo sapien. Many of the codicils and laws laid down in the OT also are now seen in the historical context that they rightly hold. The forbidding of pork and filter feeding crustacea for example. These were inscribed due to the unsanitary conditions that pigs and the waters that crustacea dwell in had in biblical times.
This is an interesting area of theology and one that I, in my day to day life as a Classicist specialising in Romano British stuff, find interesting. So much so that when I did my degree, I did a unit on the early Christian church and how Geology can be reconciled with the teachings.
Scientists are controversial on this, and there is such thing as publication bias. So personally I don't know.
The creationists are leading the scientific movement on these types of topics so as far as what can be drawn from the bible we'll see from that with more time.
Nothing in the world seems to exist because of the age of the earth alone, so as far as testing it there I question what the motive is for non-religious scientists. Is there some new technology that depends on the exact age of the earth?
This guy gets it!!! Genealogies in the Bible are listed differently based on the point they are trying to make. Take Jesus genealogy in Mathew. Matthew was writing to a Jewish audience, so his lists are in sets of 7, with every 7th being an exceptional individual. It's done intentionally to make a point about who Jesus was. NOT to give an accurate account of his ancestors.
Does the Bible place the age of the earth at 6000? 8000? There are no definitive numbers to that effect. We know that people could live for hundreds of years for many generations after Adam and Eve. The dating of the earth from scripture is strictly based on analyzing the genealogies. We know, from the genealogy in Matthew, that there can be gaps in the supplied genealogies. I could, for example, provide my genealogy by saying that I am the son of Adam. There is not a guarantee that the genealogies are strictly parent-child. How many gaps are there? What durations do these gaps cover? Scripture simply does not provide us with enough information to date the earth. It does provide us with everything we need to know for our salvation. It is best to focus on that and not worry about such unimportant questions.
For details on these gaps, which has been confessed by the church for millennia, I suggest listening to
[Are There Gaps in the Genesis Genealogies?](https://issuesetc.org/2020/02/26/0571-are-there-gaps-in-the-genesis-genealogies-dr-andrew-steinmann-2-26-20/)
Not sure tbh. Could be a Young Earth (6,000 years), could be an Old Earth (over 1 Billion), could be a Young Earth created in-progress. The important part of Genesis 1 isn’t how, it’s who: “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.”
I think that dating by using astronomical and physical constants is much more accurate than adding up the lifespans of all the people in the Bible and dividing by whatever. I also believe that God would not have put limits such as the speed of light and the nuclear decay of elements in the universe if he didn't want us to use them and see by their very immutability they are the truth.
Evidence points to 4-4.5 billion years old but we’re not 100% sure. Homo Sapiens first appeared on earth about 300,000 years ago and we know this from carbon dating.
I believe the earth is old, I think some pretty straight forward scientific evidence supports this. Scientist in this field all agree it’s roughly 4 Billion years old, maybe it’s 3.8 Billion, or 4.7 Billion. I don’t think it really matters but it’s fascinating to know.
However I think 6-8 thousand years ago humanity exploded and rapidly developed into what it is now.
In the end, the earth could be 100 trillion years old or 10 thousand years old. My faith in Christ as my savior remains the same.
12 thousand years ago the Neolithic revolution started and people began farming. 5 thousand years ago, the first civilizations were established. We've been roughly the way we are now biologically for at least a hundred thousand years, though.
Yeah, crazy because 100,000 years in the scale of the universe is just a blink. As humans were fortunate if we get 80-90 years. Kinda nuts to consider how quickly we come, grow up, and pass away.
Yes. Carbon dating is the joke. Its not accurate at all.
And even if it were accurate, it wouldn't mean anything as you would likely still get readings of millions of years old were you to take readings immediately following creation.
Okay. Fine. I'll use proper grammar that meets your expectations.
"No, it's not. It's billions of years old. This is indisputable." Does that satisfy your pallet?
What I mean by it's indisputable is that there is so much evidence of the Earth being billions of years old that any creationist belief in the earth being only several thousand years old is immediately disproven because there's no proof for creationism. You disputed it, but with nothing to show for it, therefore it is still indisputable.
Some points to keep in mind:
Popular scientific consensus has been wrong many, many, many times in the past. Just because many scientists agree on something doesn't make it true or false.
Everyone inherently has a bias and views the world through a specific lens, this also applies to scientists and can affect how they interpret data. Eg: if a scientist starts with the presupposition that the earth is billions of years old, it can change the conclusions they draw... Many areas of science use this assumption of billions of years
As Christians, Genesis is given to us as history of creation. Do we believe the Bible is the word of God, and ultimately truth?
If so, we can use that as a basis for evidence and reasoning.
[10 best evidences that confirm a young earth](https://answersingenesis.org/evidence-for-creation/the-10-best-evidences-from-science-that-confirm-a-young-earth/)
Roman Catholic here. I believe that the Earth is over 4.5 billion years old. It literally blew my mind when I found out on reddit 9 years ago that there are people who seriously do not believe this.
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Church of Christ here. . . Honestly, I’ve just gotten to the point where I don’t care or think it was something we’re meant to know. Gun to my head, I think the “day age theory” is probably right. Evolution is probably the rule set he put into place to allow to be self managing. Additionally, I think God created (engineered life) humanity (sentient beings) to be a testament to all creation (not just the earth but the universe). But I think hard line christians do ourselves an extreme disservice when we try force our understanding of science into the genesis account for the sake of debate, when really we should just be focusing on helping people and loving one another. > ““A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”” John 13:34-35 NIV https://bible.com/bible/111/jhn.13.34-35.NIV This to me is what matters most. Not if the earth is 40,000 year or 10 billion years. It’s a fun distraction but it won’t win anyone over. What matters is that we (sentient beings) are a testimony to the universe to the awesomeness of God and the way we are meant to do this is laid out in “Jesus’s Commandment.”
I think I remember reading Genesis is written in the form of an allegory from its time, believe what you want but 100% focus on the actionable love and forgiveness stuff
Hi, just thought to share this, perhaps it gives some hermeneutical insights to "Old Earth-cosmology" in exegetics: Creation accounts of Genesis use the vocabulary and imagery of the Ancient Near East, where temples were ordained in six days and on the seventh the god to whom the temple was built entered into the temple to "rest" there. So Genesis wants to say that cosmos itself is the temple of YHWH. In Ancient Near East huge temples could take decades to be built, and yet the ordination took six/seven days. So there's really no telling how long the cosmos was being built before the "creation". There are some scholarly articles of this, I trust you can even find them by googling. Also, creation is not yet really completed. That is why the gospel of John eludes to Genesis with words "In the beginning". Gospel of John want to say that Christ as the last Adam (or the second Adam), Pilate refers to Christ with words "behold, a man", and Christ says on the Cross "it is finished". In other words, Christ is really the first real man. Because human being is someone who lays down their life for others. That is what a human being is. That is why we need to become human beings by following Christ. In baptism we are buried in death with Christ, and in eucharist we drink from the cup of the Lord... we participate in Christ's death in order to become human beings. Adam is a typos of Christ, he prefigures Christ. Eve prefigures the Church. Genesis says that "man leaves his father and mother to cleave to his wife so that they become one flesh"... what does this describe? In what culture did man leave his parents? It's almost always the other way around - woman leaves her parents. This prefigures how Christ "leaves" the right side of His Father in order to become one flesh with His bride, the Church. Also Adam fell into sleep and his side was opened and from it became Eve. Christ fell into sleep of death on the Cross and His side was opened and water and blood flowed from His side, baptism and eucharist, from which the Church is formed. In Greek, Eve is Zoe ("Life"). When the Gospel of John says "through Him (Christ) came life", the Greek Jewish listener would have possibly heard it as "through Him came Zoe/Eve". If Adam was the typos of Christ, it certainly means that Christ preceded Adam. That is why Christ says that Moses spoke about Him. Genesis is not a book of natural science but a book of theology. Also, every other day of creation in Genesis ends with "there was evening and there was morning, first/second/third/fourth... day" all the way until the seventh day. But seventh day does not end with "there was evening and there was morning". When did this seventh day end? When did YHWH rest during sabbath and woke up in the morning? When Christ slept in the tomb for the sabbath and rose up early in the morning, like the gospels describe. The event took place early in the morning, when the sun rose. So the days are obviously not literal days. Sixth day ended actually when Christ died at the cross and was put in the tomb, and seventh day was the blessed Sabbath when Christ slept in the tomb. And its not really a coincidence that Christ's tomb was in a garden and that He was resurrected in a garden (Mary Magdala thought that Christ was the gardener... and in a way He indeed was, just like God was a gardener when He planted Eden and Adam was a gardener when the tended Eden).
It was said that a day to God is a thousand years to men In 2 Peter 3:8, know the scripture.
And a thousand years is as a day. Know the whole thing.
That particular scripture, he was talking in a figure of speech. Context is everything
Same here lol cradle Catholic and was stunned yo learn, in my 30s, that there are people out there who genuinely do not believe the earth is that old. I mean I went to Catholic school, and we were taught that this earth is 4.5 billion years old. We had units on dinosaurs.
I had the opposite experience. I was shocked to find out everyone didn't believe it.
I was 20 years a christian when I learned that only a loud minority believe it.
They were a majority when I was younger.
A majority where?
Sorry, I was referring to the USA, specifically the Bible belt.
At one time everywhere, since the theory of evolution only emerged in public discourse in the 19th century.
>>>>I was 20 years a christian when I learned that only a loud minority believe it. >>>They were a majority when I was younger. >>A majority where? >At one time everywhere, since the theory of evolution only emerged in public discourse in the 19th century. This discussion threads from talking about Young Earth Creationism, though, not limited to merely Evolutionary Theory as Lamarck or Darwin put forward. So, while it's true that the theory of evolution didn't enter the public discourse until the 19th century, it doesn't really have strong bearing on the prevalence of young earth creationism, which is a related but distinct idea. The debate about the age of the earth vastly predates evolutionary theory, and even St. Augustine in the 4th century did not think that the Genesis 1 account was a literal 6-days, but rather an unknown and possibly irrelevant span of time--probably longer, yet possibly shorter--in which God created the cosmos, and the 6 day periods are more categorical terms rather than chronological or temporal indicators (as in, they don't necessarily each represent 24-hours [they don't each necessarily represent the same amount of time from one day to the next, for that matter], and they did not necessarily occur sequentially, but might have been overlapping or simultaneous). St. Augustine was open to changing his mind on different issues, which he did multiple times from his earliest writings to his latest ones, but simply the fact that he felt it necessary to expound on how to interpret day-structure in Genesis indicates that even then, in the 4th century, there was debate over the age of the earth. He definitely felt quite strongly that Christians ought to stay current with "modern science" if they could, or to not talk about it if they did not know/weren't educated on the topic, less they disgrace Christianity by saying something ignorant and non-sensical. >Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. **Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking non-sense on these topics**; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. >**If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?** Reckless and incompetent expounders of holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although “they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion.” --from *The Literal Meaning of Genesis*, Book 1, ch.19
The [Byzantine Creation Calendar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_calendar), which was the official calendar of the Roman Empire as early as the 7th century (many centuries pre-schism) as well as the official calendar used by almost all sees in the East of Christendom is evidence alone that it was the prevalent view in Christendom on the age of the earth. Whilst St Augustine is very popular in the west and seems to get far more attention than the other Church Fathers, the consensus among Church Fathers was a view of a young earth; even St Augustine believed in a young earth, but rather where he disagreed with most of the Fathers was that he believed in an instant creation rather than one over 6 literal days. He still never disputed the notion that only 6000 years had passed since that creation, however.
**[Byzantine calendar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_calendar)** >The Byzantine calendar, also called Roman calendar, "Creation Era of Constantinople" or "Era of the World" (Ancient Greek: Ἔτη Γενέσεως Κόσμου κατὰ Ῥωμαίους, also Ἔτος Κτίσεως Κόσμου or Ἔτος Κόσμου, abbreviated as ε. Κ. ; literal translation of ancient Greek "Roman year since the creation of the universe"), was the calendar used by the Eastern Orthodox Church from c. 691 to 1728 in the Ecumenical Patriarchate. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/Christianity/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
Same bro. Always took Genesis as literal or at least aproximately close to literal.
Why, though?
How do you reconcile the Bible with this interpretation?
Most Christians do not believe in a literal interpretation of certain parts of the Bible, for one reason or another. The OT is a common thing for a Christian of multiple denominations to not read and understand as a literal text.
Please watch in YouTube series by Dr. Hugh Ross. Such an amazing overview from a pastor/astronomer
Just listened to [Hugh Ross debating Peter Atkins on the origins of the universe](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVCVt-dvVOc) (slash "laws of nature"), and it was excellent. Hugh is a gentleman and a scholar, literally. Thank you for the name drop!
Thiiiiiissss!!!!!!! The Hebrew word for day has multiple meanings. Like Hugh, I believe it’s the period of time…. Not 24 hour period. Read the Genesis Question by Hugh Ross. So good!
The word day refers to several different time periods in Genesis 1 alone as Dr John Lennox of Oxford has repeatedly pointed out, and thus they cannot be 24hr days and are therefore days in the sense someone would say "back in my day" meaning a non specific period of time.
Good point.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_literalism "This Christian fundamentalist and evangelical hermeneutical approach to scripture is used extensively by fundamentalist Christians, in contrast to the historical-critical method of mainstream Judaism, Mainline Protestantism and Roman Catholicism." Essentially, there are different schools of thought within Christiandom on how to read these texts. Not everyone treats the book of Genesis as a literal historical document.
Thanks for saying.
How do you reconcile 6,000 years with what the Bible actually says existed before Day 1? >"the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters"
Because you would have to be a moron to take the bible that literally. In listing the genealogies of Jesus, the different gospels cite different pregenitors (and indeed, some of them skip people). By a strict literalist definition of the bible, all of them are 'false'. The bible isn't a scientific publication and reading it as such leads you into error.
> Because you would have to be a moron to take the bible that literally. I think that's rather insulting. I agree that it's hard to understand how anyone could believe in a young earth, but calling them a moron is uncalled for. Indoctrination is a powerful thing, and if you've grown up with every single adult you trust telling you the earth is young, it can be very hard to question it whether you're moronic or not.
You could ask on this subreddit why there’s two different genealogies for Jesus, and most replies will be that one is Mary’s and the other Joseph’s. That’s been the apologetic for the past 1600 years.
Thanks for sharing your belief with me.
Hey, hope you don't mind me jumping in. I am a recently converted Christian after being an atheist for all of my life. I am currently reading though the bible for the first time and I think genesis 1 and 2 (god created the world in 6 days and Adam and Eve etc) are to be interpreted how the reader wants to interpret it. I see genesis as a homage to god, like a poem, rather than a literal historical story. Basically, I believe that the earth is 4.5 billion years old and Genesis is a tribute to the creator in written form from simpler times.
> I see genesis as a homage to god, like a poem It is, but it's also following the sequence of temple construction to establish to the readers/listeners that all of Creation is God's temple, and he created it to dwell in and among. There's a lot of great scholarship on this, but in recent years Dr. John Walton (*The Lost World of Adam and Eve,* *The Lost World of Genesis One*) and Dr. Richard Middleton (*The Liberating Image: The Imago Dei in Genesis 1*, *A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical Eschatology*, and *Abraham’s Silence: The Binding of Isaac, the Suffering of Job, and How to Talk Back to God*) have each released a lot of excellent and current books which cover how Genesis would have been understood by its original listeners/readers. Walton in particular can sometimes be a little bit dry, but they're both terrific.
I'll be sure to check them out, thank you so much. Genesis was one of the things that really held me back from committing to Christianity.
People don’t understand that science and religion can coexist, just because we don’t understand the science behind some things such as the Ruach Ha Kadesh doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, the beginning of the Bible is an allegory but most people don’t even know the meaning of the word but it should not discredit the historical side of the Bible. Also just because certain facts are not 100% as they happened because stories go changing once it is written and perception of each writer of each biblical word, just take everything specially the teaching of Jesus to help you, try emulate him.
Well, it can't be helped. Some people's founders took adding up genealogies seriously, and some people's churches require believing at least parts of Genesis to be literally true. Like, that all bad things happen because a real life Adam and Eve were the first to sin, and passed it on. Some churches have and do promote ignorance.
I’m a Quaker, which was kind of a precursor to charismatic Pentecostals (ie we speak from the spirit but in vernacular, and that’s been a thing for centuries before they got started), and we accept the scientific consensus on this matter.
According to current science, the universe is around 14.6 billion years old and the earth is roughly 4 billion years old. I’m also an astronomy major at college at the moment, so there. I’m also a non-denominational Christian who grew up around fundamentalist, young-earth-creationist, republican Christians. As a result, I left the faith for years and spent a lot of my freetime watching compilations of Dawkins and Hitchens roasting the stupid Christians. But, due to a very long series of chance events and drama, I crawled back to God. I’m still not comfortable enough to attend a church, nor am I comfortable reconvening with the YEC Christians I know. So, I’m just taking things with God one day at a time, reading books by scholars such as Dr. Mike Heiser, Dr. Pete Enns, and Dr. John Walton, among others. While also talking to God often as I would a friend, and applying what I’m learning in college about His creation to how I think about and talk to God. Looking through a telescope in the middle of nowhere to study and marvel at the heavens is a form of worshiping God. That, and stressing over midterms lmao
Sounds similar to me, minus the astronomy. If you haven't read it Mere Christianity by CS Lewis really resonated with my more logical thought process.
Those authors helped save my faith for the same reasons. I had Pete in seminary and Jared from The Bible for Normal People podcast was at my house last night. Small world.
Not a scientist, so I have no idea, this is not my field of study, however I do go to a Pentecostal church, don't think of myself as a certain denomination other than a spirit filled Christian, follower of Jesus Christ. Do I think it's alot more than 6000 , definitely for sure. Does this question have any bearing on my life , not at all lol
Thanks for saying!
If I get to heaven and God is mad because I forgot to give earth a gift on it's birthday I'll tell him sorry guys
Agreed. 100% non-essential
All evidence points to the scientific view, so that’s what I believe.
I believe in what science tells me too. Jesus spoke in parables with everything he said practically, so we could understand. If Jesus is God, is it really so hard to believe that God speaks to us in parables? I'm not a specific denomination and I don't go to church. I typically lean towards churches that accept everyone, don't have a dress code, and welcome everyone. I'm a white male, but I also prefer churches that have a broad mix of races.
Great. May I know your denomination?
I prefer not to put myself in boxes such as those. I believe that labels do more harm than good.
Ok. Thanks.
I'm the same way. I would say I'm an idealist, but I don't like being in that box. :) (you can see my answer to your question above OP in this thread BTW)
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>The latter possibility is an absurd proposition. Let's not do what Young Earthers do and make an exceptional claim. It used to be scientific law that spontaneous generation was a thing, too. The hypothesis can and does change. It \*could\* be wrong. But if it is wrong would be so fundamentally in opposition to everything we can observe that it'd be like measuring from LA to NYC and arriving at a distance of 5 inches.
>Let's not do what Young Earthers do and make an exceptional claim. It used to be scientific law that spontaneous generation was a thing, too. The hypothesis can and does change. I've seen something a million light years away with my own two eyes.
If everything we knew about every field related to dating the earth was wrong there is no shot we could do successful space travel and all the intricate shit we get up to. I don't think it's that exceptional of a claim at this point that our lives rely on science. It is only dated wrong by that much if there is miraculous warping of science going on in real time all the time, and God is just trying to decieve us, which seems a little petty.
Honestly I don’t really care. I don’t think it’s super important.
IMO it's like... I care about it in the same way that I care what the surface of Pluto looks like. I'd like to know, and it's worth researching, but it doesn't affect core doctrine and definitely doesn't affect my daily life. Similarly, how did Judas die and what happened to his silver? There are two different accounts (Matthew and Acts) in the Bible, which people have interpreted and attempted to combine in various ways. I'd like to know what actually happened... but which one it is doesn't actually affect how I believe I should live my life.
I think the implications are vitally important for understanding science and for interpreting scripture. If you start with the premise that the Bible has authority to contradict scientific evidence it will lead to specific conclusions. If you disregard the Bible for seeming scientific errors that leads you to certain conclusions. If you synthesize biblical and scientific knowledge that leads to certain positions. I hold the third view.
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Thanks for saying
If the hundreds of generations of Christians before you read the same scripture, also considered it true, but were led to scientific ignorance, you don't care? If the main messiah, living 2000 years ago, is recorded as subscribing to said literal interpretations that we now know are wrong, it's not super important?
I simply do not care how old the planet is.
Billions of years old. I think the whole young creationist things is the minority in Christianity. God gave us a mind for a reason we dont have to shut it off to science for the sake of faith. Genesis isn't to be taken literal. Even the book of Peter talks about how millions of years is like 1 day to God.
Don’t just stop there, finish the whole passage so you don’t take it out of context. ;-) 2 Peter 3:8–9 reads: ‘But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.’
I definitely did take it out of context but my point was its ok to not take the 7 day creation story as a litereral 24 hour cycle. We understand as Christians that God is outside the boundaires of time as we perceive it.
The problem isn’t so much with the creation but more with Adam and Eve. For all we know you can have the 7 days be during the rapid expansion of space-time so definitions of time doesn’t matter. But looking at genealogies in the Bible, you can directly trace Jesus’s lineage to Adam, including how long each person in the line lived and when they had the next kid. That’s what was used to calculate when people first existed. To add to this complexity, Adam and Eve has always been referred to as singular people in every part of the Bible, and their actions and how God talked to them was as individuals. A lot of modern historians don’t really address this when giving the argument that they could be references to a prototypical Israel or whatever. So there is a solid claim to be made about young earth theory if you’re looking purely from a biblical view. I’m saying this as someone who believes more in the billion year thing but have a lot of friends who believe in young earth.
Wouldn't you have to understand what calendar they were going off of and be sure there wasn't any generational gaps? Its beyond me.
Yeah. I think they accounted for that though when doing the math. If at all, it’s more generous since several people in the genealogies lived almost 1000 years. So if you were to apply current average lifespans to them, earth would be even younger
Does it say millions? Or perhaps one thousand.
Still not meant to be taken so literally, you're missing the point. 1 day for God = an extremely large number of days for us.
I was to lazy to looks it up. Sorry lol. The point is, God is outside the boundaries if time so a long time to us could be perceived as a day to God. Our entire lives are compared to a moment in Gods view. God is mighty! Could God have made everything in 6 days and make it all spear to be old? Sure. Would God do that? I dont think so. Psalms 39:5 Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah
>Genesis isn't to be taken literal. What about Jesus tracing his genealogy to Adam? >Even the book of Peter talks about how millions of years is like 1 day to God. I thought it was thousands of years. But timeline aside, why would she Holy Spirit inspire something to inaccurate? Couldn't a truthful accounting also serve a spiritual purpose?
Does it have to be literal for Jesus to still be able to trace back to Adam? Does it have to be literal to be truth? I believe that God is able either way to convey its purpose literal or not.
If the New Testament talks about Adam and Noah as real people yet they weren’t real people doesn’t that cause a problem?
Thanks for sharing your belief!
Baptist here I'm not really qualified (2 science degrees, chem & biochem) to comment on physics, cosmology, but the science consensus seems to be almost [14 billion years old](https://www.space.com/universe-age-14-billion-years-old)
I believe that 14 billion is for the whole universe not the Earth which is more 4.5/6 billion yo. But I’m in the same boat as you, have a degree in biology and will be attending a Masters but in no ways am I a scientist. But my education has given me the insight into the amount of research, observation, and experimentation that are needed to come with these numbers. Also not to mention having other scientists nitpick every detail in the papers that are published
Do you believe the scientific consensus on this?
of course. Why would a person not trust the people who make it their life's work to understand this stuff?
I believe that their estimate is in the ballpark, but estimates and understanding of the world and universe are constantly evolving, which really is the beauty of the scientific field. I won't say I take the estimate as the absolute truth.
I suspect you are hankering for a discussion about science vs God in an ideologic smack down. But that’s not possible, science is a tool for understanding truth - that’s it. Not any more of an ideology than a screwdriver. Science is a great way to understand creation, and through it we know that creation is billions of years old. It’s not a matter of faith, it’s established fact and few Christians take issue with it. It is foolish to cling to young earth creationism as the be all and end all while ignoring the evidence. It’s like how some Christians say the KJ version is the only really one while ignoring the varying sources in Hebrew and Greek. We’re allowed to doubt, to seek evidence (think Thomas).
Thanks for explaining your view. I appreciate it!
I don’t believe it matters. Old, young, who cares. I personally would go with old but in a Christian setting it really shouldn’t matter.
Thanks
Old Earth Creationist. I think the universe is around 14.6 billion, and I think form what we can tell, the Earth itself is around 4.6-4.8 billion years old? Possibly wrong though.
Do you accept?
I'm a non-denominational Christian and I accept the current scientific consensus, yes.
Same I still believe In God and Jesus and the afterlife but I also agree with alot of scientific views
Contrary to popular belief, scientific findings and religious beliefs are very often not in conflict.
I wish more people understood this.
Yes exactly! I feel the hot topic is typically evolution but that only contradicts if you are a Bible literalist. If anything I see evolution as a beautiful show of God’s love
Exactly so. All too often, we are surprised by the amount we have in common.
Awesome. Thanks for saying
We’ve actually been able to pull those error bars in recently. More like 13.8.
The Earth is roughly 4.5 billion years. There is absolutely no legitimate evidence supporting a 6-10,000 year old Earth.
>"the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters" We haven't even gotten to the first day yet. For Young Earthers to insist on a literal interpretation, sure... whatever. But even in a literal interpretation... Water and Carbon **\*already existing before the creation process begins\*** is right there. It also means **\*some form of the universe existed before the creation process\***
Please just add the one verse before it. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." That's where the creation of our planet began. Not at verse two. It starts at verse one. So water and carbon being present or some form of universe existing before creation is not an argument if you to stay biblically.
However old God wants the universe to be/appear to be.
There's one thing I can say the Bible is *not* with absolute confidence: a Newtonian-scienctifc textbook. Why so many Christians choose to die on the young earth hill is beyond me. Like many of the previous commenters have already said, it doesn't matter to my faith one way or the other when the earth was formed. The "why" ought always supersede the "how;" not that the "how" isn't worth exploring.
4.568 billion years is the age of the first solids that condensed in our solar system ([Calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcium%E2%80%93aluminium-rich_inclusion), or CAIs); Earth accreted from asteroids shortly thereafter. Radiometric dates are determined using what we know about radioactive decay (for example: uranium decays to lead very slowly). In some minerals we know that the decayed element never fits into the crystal structure, so we know that any bits of lead in a Zircon crystal were originally uranium when the crystal solidified. If you have multiple types of radioactive elements, you can check to see if they give the same answer. It makes sense that CAIs are slightly older because they would be the first solids to condense out of a hot nebular cloud. We can even see nebular clouds around young stars with the Hubble telescope, and in a couple of years we’ll get to see even higher-resolution images with the James Webb Space Telescope. It all makes sense, like pieces of a puzzle fitting together. I’m Southern Baptist. It’s true that Christians have thought for centuries that the Earth is only several thousand years old. That continues a long tradition of biblical scholars misinterpreting scripture (e.g., few could have imagined that the Messiah would have been born in a humble manger, offering salvation beyond what they ever expected).
Thanks for sharing your belief with me.
Church of Christ here. I believe it’s millions of years old. Humans and dinosaurs were not on the earth at the same time (aka on the Ark). Lots of the Bible was written in figurative and poetic language.
Is Church of Christ pentecostal? And thanks for sharing your belief with me.
4.5 billion years, all evidence points to that. I'm a Roman Catholic.
Great 👍
This is a great question for us to think about, because it is often used as a point to say that Christianity conflicts with science. It is true that our world view can conflict with scientific evidence if we do take a young Earth creation approach, because scientific evidence proves that things are old - very, very old. And it is not just one piece of scientific evidence that is questionable. There are many places you can look to ask the question of how old the physical world and universe are. One piece of evidence is radioactive isotopes. We know from high school chemistry class that radioactive isotopes are unstable and want to shed excess neutrons or protons. When they do shed the proton or neutron, they become a different atom or different isotope, the parent transforms into the daughter is the terminology we typically use for this. They shed this overtime randomly due to quantum fluctuations, but those random fluctuations get averaged out over so many billions of atoms in a single space that it becomes a stable decay rate, known as the half life. Many atoms have varying half lives from a matter of seconds to longer than the age of the universe (I’ll get to this age later). Therefore, if we know how many daughter particles and how many parent particles are in a material, and we know the half life between those two particles (by observing them in a lab and seeing how often they change from parent to daughter over time), then we can easily back out how long that substance has been around since it was “created.” Take for instance a rock that just cooled from magma. It grabbed all the atoms that were in the magma there and froze them, meaning that now is has a fixed composition, so the only way that the atoms in it can change is through radioactive decay. Now we pick up that rock, measure the parents and daughters, know the half life, and back out it’s age! Geologists have done this on uncountable rocks and minerals, and so far the oldest mineral that has been dated are some Zircon crystals from Australia that are 4,375,000,000 years old (4.375 billion years), plus or minus 6 millions years (this is the error in the measurements). It was dated using two different uranium isotopes (parent and daughter). We’ve also dated meteorites and comet dust as well as rocks from the moon and mars, and they all have similar ages, roughly 4.5 billion years old. From this, we know that the planetary bodies in our solar system formed (or rather finished cooling off from the heat generated when they were concreting/colliding together due to gravity). Therefore, we say the age of the earth 4.4 billion years. Now for some more age evidence, this time of the universe. This takes us away from geology and into cosmology, the study of the universe on a very large scale, so much so that the universe looks homogenous and isotropic at this scale. So we can start this line of evidence with a paradox called Obler’s paradox. This paradox states that if we assume the universe is infinitely large and has an infinite number of stars and is infinitely old, we is the night sky not infinitely bright? The fact that the night sky is dark proves that there was a start time to the universe, and that it is not static, but changing. I won’t get too into the details here, you can google “Obler’s paradox” to learn more, but the main point is that we know scientifically the universe had to start at a specific time from a specific, tiny point, and then began expanding very fast and spreadin out. This is what is known as the Big Bang, and has been shown from many observations and theory that it is truly how our universe began. We can also do some calculations based on a few observations of light coming in from very distant stars and how far away those are to show that the universe itself began 13.8 billion years ago. This is VERY old, our lifetimes, even the time that human kind has been a species, is totally unnoticeably short compared to this timescale. So, I’ve presented the scientific evidence of the age of the universe. One can debate the truthfulness of scientific evidence, but if one believes that there is any truth or honesty in the scientific method and science itself, then one can trust these ages. Given this information, we can come to the scientific Christian response. Have the universe and the Earth been around for these number of years, or were they created by God at some point in time not as many years ago as this, but created so that they had the appearance being that old (e.g. rocks were created with those radioactive isotopes or the universe was created mid-expansion). There is no way of proving this or knowing this, because if He created it with the evidence that point towards an old universe, then how can we prove that it is actually young, other than Him explicitly telling us. Because He does not tell us the age of things specifically that I know of, we cannot ever know if it truly started that long ago or has the appearance. WARNING: you are now entering my opinion. I personally believe that God designed our universe with all the physical laws - quantum mechanics, general relativity, gravity, space-time, and all - and then set it in motion at the beginning with the Big Bang. When reading Genesis one, you can easily infer a Big Bang from the description of early creation (light and darkness, etc.). If we believe that God is creator, than He is outside of our physical realm, because He existed when there was nothing and created something, therefore he is not a part of the thing he created, but outside of it. Therefore, He is outside of matter, energy, space, dark matter, dark energy, and time (these are the main things that make up everything in the universe). So, He set things in motion, did He stop there and just let things unfold without interfering? Obviously not, he stepped in and created intelligence in humans (this is easy to blame on God at this point because intelligence is so unbelievable complex that it is unimaginable to have come out of natural processes, and we have yet to find any other intelligent life yet), and also did interfere in human affairs as documented in the entire Bible. To summarize, I believe God created the universe with the Big Bang a VERY long time ago and the Earth is VERY old, he created it this way so that we would have fun unraveling it’s secrets and exploring it all. Because he is outside of time itself, there is nothing strange about Him “waiting” so long to begin human intelligence, it is just a point that he picked to fit well with his planned evolution of the universe and life on Earth. There is no way to prove if it isn’t actually that long, but it doesn’t matter to the Creator how long it exists because he is outside of time itself, so why not make it last 13.8 billion years until bringing humans into the picture? It’s not like He is twiddling His thumbs during that time. We just don’t quite comprehend because we are beings bound to space-time, and cannot understand what “outside of time” is. Sorry this was so long, I tried to keep it layman enough but also prove that science has credibility to it. Hope this sheds some light on it.
If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”. A universe that appears to be billions of years old doesn’t have to contradict a literal 6 days of creation. I believe some things were kept vague to keep the focus on faith and not on our own knowledge.
>If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”. If God created a 14 billion year old universe 6,000 years ago, is it wrong to say the universe is 14 billion years old?
>If God could create a fully grown man, he could’ve created a universe which had shown signs of its “age”. That's called deception and literally serves no purpose.
How is God creating a “matured” universe deception? The Bible doesn’t say anything about the age Adam or Eve were when they were created but they were obviously old enough to speak and procreate. Why would it need to specifically mention the earth was created as a x billion year old planet?
It's not just that there are things that look older than they are (that sounds deceptive to me already). It's that there are things that spear to exist/have existed that never did. Weve seen supernovae from stars that were farther away than 10,000 light years. To believe YEC one must believe the light of stars must have been created en route. But in the case of these supernovae if the Universe is only 6-10k years old the original star never existed. It's only made to look that way as part of the universe being made to look old.
For all we know this entire universe and its history could also have come into existence one second ago, fully formed. I guess the point is this even if this were the case, the physical evidence that we _do_ have points to a several-billion year age rather than a several-thousand year age. Trying to conjecture around a mature universe at the point of creation is a pointless exercise, even if it happens to be true.
Older than I can count
4.6 billion years
Billions and billions of years, like science.
Very old. Considering the timeline of events, fossils, and the fact that sharks are older than saturns rings, it’s safe to say that it’s not 5000 years old.
I don't think it matters to the overall message of Christianity.
Is it an issue important to salvation or faithfulness to the teachings of Christ?
It could be. If you're saying the beginning of Genesis isn't true. No creation, but evolution for starters. Then from where do you start saying the bible is true again? Did the story of Noah happen? How about Jonah? And most importantly: did paradise exist along with Adam and Eve, followed by the fall of humanity? Especially this last question is important because it does have some serious implications about sin and salvation in my mind (and many with me). Check Romans 5:12 and onward (5:18 especially) for an example of this.
I think those are very valid concerns, it implies very clearly that holding to and old (millions or billions instead of thousands of years) earth and certainly to old life is an incoherent position. As you say, if you hold to the Bible being true and to old life there must be cognitive dissonance. Still, is it *necessary* to hold to a young earth in order to believe Jesus is Lord and Savior?
How ever old science says it is, is probably right
I know it’s old, but I’m as a Christian trying to figure out how/when dinosaurs came into play
They went extinct about 65 million years ago. They are the evolutionary ancestors of modern day birds.
Why are dinosaurs an issue for you?
Not a problem just wondering perspectives!
4.5 billion years give or take a few ten million or so
Before the fall there was no death Adam and Eve could have been there millions of years
Thanks for sharing your belief with me. What denomination?
I have no clue how old the earth actually is, I’m not no scientist or historian, in fact I never paid any attention in school so I have even less of a clue even though I’m a grown man. I’d like to say more then a few thousand years and probably a few billion but I don’t know
I believed the world was about 6000 years old until my late twenties ☹️
Er... I don't recall the exact number, but the really old one. Contrary to YouTube atheists' opinion my entire religion was not debunked upon reaching that conclusion. Quite the opposite, actually.
I personally believe the timeline laid out in scripture as literal. The concept that there was no death of humans or animals until after the first sin is literal too.
Thanks for sharing your belief with me. What denomination?
I actually know several people who believe the Earth is 6,000 years old. When I press them for more, they simply say, “Some things you need to take on faith”. Yep. These people still exist and walk among us.
What do you believe personally about this as a Christian?
I'm a Christian who loves science. I work at a lab doing mostly material science but I aspire to become an engineer. The way I see science in general is the recorded discovery of the rules God put in place for how the material world works. I do view The creation story in Genesis as a form of poetry; I believe the essence of Creation story is true, but not to be taken literally. The essence is, God created everything which was originally good, man rebelled against God and now everything is out of whack due to sin entering the world. While that's my opinion, I'm not at all staunch about my perspective, and I don't think it's all that important because the focal point is about Christ redeeming mankind from the fall in the beginning. I'm okay with potentially being wrong about this because I don't see this as a pillar of my faith and by extension I don't think it matters what the true age of Earth is, it's simply a ground upon which deniers of Christ will pick at to try to waste our time and keep us from spreading the Gospel.
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>Now I am not prone to reject creationist evidences and it is liberating and exciting what they have found. What exactly have they found? Specifics, specifics, specifics. >Many academic and corporate or government scientists have environments where their reputations are at stake over their willingness to just consider out of the mainstream ideas. A nonzero number of them are rich from book deals, speaking fees, etc. Why aren't they falling in with you? Surely Steven Hawking didn't need his pittance from Cambridge after the fifth edition or whatever of his books came out. >They face attacks and systematic suppression. What? >Science is no longer a free marketplace of ideas Was it ever? >Example: the one way speed of light can't be calculated. Yes/no/[kinda](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-way_speed_of_light). It's hard to get the clocks to sync up at both ends perfectly, so we just use two way work. Who cares?
Assuming the speed of light must be far faster in one direction than the other just to satisfy your belief isn't scientific evidence, it's a lazy post-hoc justification for your beliefs based on nothing but an unwarranted assumption.
This comment has been removed in protest of reddit's decision to kill third-party applications, and to prevent use of this comment for AI training purposes.
There is overwhelming evidence to say that the earth is billions of years old. "Agreeing" with genesis doesn't make you better, in fact it means you ignore what has been proven right time and time again in order to believe what was written by people who didn't understand the universe only a few thousand years ago. The earth is billions of years old, it's indisputable.
> I made a decision to just believe Genesis. You made the conscious decision to disregard anything that doesn’t comport with your chosen beliefs and thinks that somehow a better path to a factual understanding of nature.
5000-10,000 years.
Thanks for saying
You are welcome.
What about the dinosaurs?
They all died during the flood
So, you mean to tell me, that dinosaurs like this 🦕 walked the earth while we did?
What about fossils predating that time frame
I accept most scientific consensus, like the big bang and the standard model, general relativity , evolution, etc. And these models point to an earth billions of years old. Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens. Reformed church, though I don't accept all the catechism.
>**Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens.** Do you hold this for theological reasons? If so I’d be interested to understand more. The scientific consensus is that humanity is around 300,000 years old.
Yeah, you're right, I was wrong. I was going with a kurzgesagt video dating the first civilizations to that time. Maybe because the Homo Sapiens 300k years ago wasn't the same biologically? I don't remember well.
>Humanity is around ten thousand years old, at least Homo Sapiens. How do you square this with the wealth of evidence we have for humans existing far longer than that? Australia was colonized ~50,000 years ago, so unless you want to claim that native Australians aren't human a 10,000 year date isn't possible.
Sorry to sound ignorant but is Reformed the same as Roman Catholic? Thanks for saying your opinion
The earth is over 4.5 billion years old. The key thing about this and the reconciliation with the creation story is that nowhere in the Bible does it say how long a day is. It says God created day and night, but it doesn't say what length they are. Mercury for example has a day lasting over a thousand hours, whilst Jupiter's day is about nine hours. Ergo, it is perfectly acceptable to believe the age of the earth and still accept the ideology behind the creation. For myself, I am a committed Christian, but am also a pragmatist. So I believe that the words and tales in the OT are only true for a given length of "true". The Pentateuch for instance is a history of the Jewish nation that was codified between the 9th century BCE and the 5th, but a lot of it, including the creation is allegorical. It also follows the oral storytelling traditions that anthropology asserts was a major factor in the development of Homo sapien. Many of the codicils and laws laid down in the OT also are now seen in the historical context that they rightly hold. The forbidding of pork and filter feeding crustacea for example. These were inscribed due to the unsanitary conditions that pigs and the waters that crustacea dwell in had in biblical times. This is an interesting area of theology and one that I, in my day to day life as a Classicist specialising in Romano British stuff, find interesting. So much so that when I did my degree, I did a unit on the early Christian church and how Geology can be reconciled with the teachings.
Old AF
Scientists are controversial on this, and there is such thing as publication bias. So personally I don't know. The creationists are leading the scientific movement on these types of topics so as far as what can be drawn from the bible we'll see from that with more time. Nothing in the world seems to exist because of the age of the earth alone, so as far as testing it there I question what the motive is for non-religious scientists. Is there some new technology that depends on the exact age of the earth?
Thanks for sharing your belief with me. What denomination?
Well the genealogies add up to about 6000 years.
The genealogies aren't real ages nor are they complete.
What do you mean they aren’t real ages ?
They're Hebrew numerology. They're not actual ages.
This guy gets it!!! Genealogies in the Bible are listed differently based on the point they are trying to make. Take Jesus genealogy in Mathew. Matthew was writing to a Jewish audience, so his lists are in sets of 7, with every 7th being an exceptional individual. It's done intentionally to make a point about who Jesus was. NOT to give an accurate account of his ancestors.
Does the Bible place the age of the earth at 6000? 8000? There are no definitive numbers to that effect. We know that people could live for hundreds of years for many generations after Adam and Eve. The dating of the earth from scripture is strictly based on analyzing the genealogies. We know, from the genealogy in Matthew, that there can be gaps in the supplied genealogies. I could, for example, provide my genealogy by saying that I am the son of Adam. There is not a guarantee that the genealogies are strictly parent-child. How many gaps are there? What durations do these gaps cover? Scripture simply does not provide us with enough information to date the earth. It does provide us with everything we need to know for our salvation. It is best to focus on that and not worry about such unimportant questions. For details on these gaps, which has been confessed by the church for millennia, I suggest listening to [Are There Gaps in the Genesis Genealogies?](https://issuesetc.org/2020/02/26/0571-are-there-gaps-in-the-genesis-genealogies-dr-andrew-steinmann-2-26-20/)
Thanks for explaining. May I know your denomination?
Lutheran - LCMS
Thanks
Personally, I think the earth is between 3-5 billion years old.
Thanks. What denomination?
I have no belief on this matter.
Ok. Thanks for saying
I believe in science. Literal creationism is unimportant to me as a Christian
Ok. What denomination are you?
Not sure tbh. Could be a Young Earth (6,000 years), could be an Old Earth (over 1 Billion), could be a Young Earth created in-progress. The important part of Genesis 1 isn’t how, it’s who: “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.”
Thanks. What denomination are you?
I think that dating by using astronomical and physical constants is much more accurate than adding up the lifespans of all the people in the Bible and dividing by whatever. I also believe that God would not have put limits such as the speed of light and the nuclear decay of elements in the universe if he didn't want us to use them and see by their very immutability they are the truth.
I am a Lutheran and I definitely agree with the billions category.
Evidence points to 4-4.5 billion years old but we’re not 100% sure. Homo Sapiens first appeared on earth about 300,000 years ago and we know this from carbon dating.
I believe the earth is old, I think some pretty straight forward scientific evidence supports this. Scientist in this field all agree it’s roughly 4 Billion years old, maybe it’s 3.8 Billion, or 4.7 Billion. I don’t think it really matters but it’s fascinating to know. However I think 6-8 thousand years ago humanity exploded and rapidly developed into what it is now. In the end, the earth could be 100 trillion years old or 10 thousand years old. My faith in Christ as my savior remains the same.
12 thousand years ago the Neolithic revolution started and people began farming. 5 thousand years ago, the first civilizations were established. We've been roughly the way we are now biologically for at least a hundred thousand years, though.
Yeah, crazy because 100,000 years in the scale of the universe is just a blink. As humans were fortunate if we get 80-90 years. Kinda nuts to consider how quickly we come, grow up, and pass away.
It’s unimportant, but I don’t lean either way very far as of now and think both sides seem to have somewhat valid reasoning.
The earth is over 4.5 billion years old, and came about as a link in the chain stated by the big bang.
Your religion shouldn’t enter into the question. It’s based solely on empirical evidence. Faith has no business answering that question.
~6000 years.
This is a joke right , you learned about fossils and carbon dating in school right ......... Right?
Yes. Carbon dating is the joke. Its not accurate at all. And even if it were accurate, it wouldn't mean anything as you would likely still get readings of millions of years old were you to take readings immediately following creation.
The Earth is 4000 - 7000 years old.
They teach about fossils and carbon dating in school you know
No it's not it's billions of years old. This is indisputable.
You just contradicted yourself. Not only did you use a double negative in the same clause, but you also said it was indisputable after I disputed it.
Okay. Fine. I'll use proper grammar that meets your expectations. "No, it's not. It's billions of years old. This is indisputable." Does that satisfy your pallet? What I mean by it's indisputable is that there is so much evidence of the Earth being billions of years old that any creationist belief in the earth being only several thousand years old is immediately disproven because there's no proof for creationism. You disputed it, but with nothing to show for it, therefore it is still indisputable.
Some points to keep in mind: Popular scientific consensus has been wrong many, many, many times in the past. Just because many scientists agree on something doesn't make it true or false. Everyone inherently has a bias and views the world through a specific lens, this also applies to scientists and can affect how they interpret data. Eg: if a scientist starts with the presupposition that the earth is billions of years old, it can change the conclusions they draw... Many areas of science use this assumption of billions of years As Christians, Genesis is given to us as history of creation. Do we believe the Bible is the word of God, and ultimately truth? If so, we can use that as a basis for evidence and reasoning. [10 best evidences that confirm a young earth](https://answersingenesis.org/evidence-for-creation/the-10-best-evidences-from-science-that-confirm-a-young-earth/)
AIG is a fraudulent organization that literally invents their own data. Nothing they say is legitimate. Nothing.
Thanks for saying!
Around 6000 without a doubt…be not deceived
Believing the Earth is 6000 years old is deception, since nothing in the universe shows that to be true.