# Lifestyles & Discussion > Peace Through Religion >  The Days Of Creation (What Does The Bible Say?)

## Sola_Fide

> The Days of Creation
> 
> 
> 
> In the beginning, God created the entire universe, out of no pre-existent material (ex nihilo), in a period of six days. And as A. A. Hodge pointed out, at the time of the writing of the Confession modern science had not yet challenged the solar day view of creation. Hence, there is little question that when the divines spoke of six creation days they had in mind twenty-four hour days. Hodge is correct. But long before modern science challenged Bible believers, there were Christian scholars (for example, Augustine), who have not held to a solar day view. Yet the divergence from a twenty-four hour day theory of creation did not seriously begin until the late 18th and early 19th centuries with the onslaught of evolutionary thinking. Sadly, the church has played the role of the sycophant; she has been all too quick to adapt to the teachings of modern scientists.
> 
> All too frequently orthodox Christians are heard to parrot the well-worn clichÈ the Bible is not a textbook on science. As John Robbins maintains, if what is meant by this statement is that the Bible is not exclusively about or especially for the study of science, then it is correct. But this is all too obvious, and it is not the normal meaning of this clichÈ. Usually when we hear the Bible is not a textbook what is meant is that we must study the Bible and then we must study science, and then we must compare notes to see what we are to believe.2 This form of thinking is well described by John Whitcomb:
> 
> Whenever there is an apparent conflict between the conclusions of the scientist and the conclusions of the theologian . . . the theologian must rethink his interpretation of the Scriptures . . . in such a way as to bring it into harmony with the general consensus of scientific opinion on these matters, since the Bible is not a textbook on science.
> ...


- See more at: http://www.trinityfoundation.org/jou....JZgTmkPK.dpuf

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## Natural Citizen

Right but light is constant so how can you have a day 1? At least on the larger scale. Did time have a beginning or has it always been? I know that we like to think of ourselves as the only significant thing that the universe has to offer but, really, we're just a speck.  And time is an illusion. A construct of the mind as it pertains to us. You know?

I just looked at the graph though. Didn't read the thing yet.

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## fr33

So did this happen?



Did man have dominion over 40 ft tall lizards and microorganisms?

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## Sola_Fide

> So did this happen?
> 
> 
> 
> Did man have dominion over 40 ft tall lizards and microorganisms?


Dominion doesn't mean that a man can jump up on a beast and ride it around for fun. I don't know why you'd even think that.

Dominion means that animals serve man...that man is the master of this earth in terms of his abilities and faculties.

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## Natural Citizen

> So did this happen?
> 
> 
> 
> Did man have dominion over 40 ft tall lizards and microorganisms?





> Now researchers are hunting for evidence that man lived among the megafauna that walked the Earth thousands of years ago... Armadillos as big as cars, crocodiles bigger than buses, six-ton mastodons and sabre-toothed tigers once shared the Earth with man in Latin America, scientists believe.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...s-believe.html

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## Natural Citizen

I seem to have read papers from this site before. A few good ones too. Well written.

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## fr33

> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...s-believe.html


It could be possible that they did exist at the same time but probably unlikely. Still I want to know if they had dominion over them like the bible says. No historical account of the discovery of these massive animals and tiny animals (microorganisms) existed until thousands of years after when Genesis allegedly took place. Nevermind the fact that the text of the bible did not offer any help in discovering these...

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## Natural Citizen

> It could be possible that they did exist at the same time but probably unlikely. Still I want to know if they had dominion over them like the bible says. No historical account of the discovery of these massive animals and tiny animals (microorganisms) existed until thousands of years after when Genesis allegedly took place. Nevermind the fact that the text of the bible did not offer any help in discovering these...


Right. They haven't found any human fossils. I don't doubt Genesis, per se. I think it's a fascinating piece of work. I Doubt the perception of the men who scribbled it up though. Or, to be clear, consider and understand the perception for what it is.

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## erowe1

> Still I want to know if they had dominion over them like the bible says.


Yes, up until Adam sinned. But there's no way to know how big any of those animals might have been during that time. It would have taken hundreds of years for a dinosaur to grow to forty feet tall, and we aren't told in the Bible at what stage in growth they were when God made them.

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## fr33

> Yes, up until Adam sinned. *But there's no way to know how big any of those animals might have been during that time.* It would have taken hundreds of years for a dinosaur to grow to forty feet tall, and we aren't told in the Bible at what stage in growth they were when God made them.


Adam was an adult? Right?

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## erowe1

> Adam was an adult? Right?


Yes.

Some reptiles grow for as long as they live. They don't stop when they're adults. I assume that must have been the case with large dinosaurs. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong about that.

ETA: I'm just speculating. There's no reason Adam couldn't have ruled over enormous dinosaurs of any size.

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## erowe1

> No historical account of the discovery of these massive animals and tiny animals (microorganisms) existed until thousands of years after when Genesis allegedly took place. Nevermind the fact that the text of the bible did not offer any help in discovering these...


I'm pretty sure the Bible offered Louis Pasteur a great deal of help in his research on microorganisms.

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## otherone

> Right. They haven't found any human fossils. I don't doubt Genesis, per se. I think it's a fascinating piece of work. I Doubt the perception of the men who scribbled it up though. Or, to be clear, consider and understand the perception for what it is.


They may be excused, as they weren't there.  They had no actual experience of creation.

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## otherone

Oh, btw..."Science and Technology"....lol.  You guys never give up....

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## Sola_Fide

> Oh, btw..."Science and Technology"....lol.  You guys never give up....


Hold on a second buddy.  If articles about the fairy tale of evolution can be posted here, then other theories can be posted here as well.

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## Sola_Fide

Anyway, the point of the article is to prove that the text and context of the Bible demand that the days of creation be understood in terms of literal 24 hour days.

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## ClydeCoulter

Still, what constitutes a 24 hour day?  A single revolution?  Does the sun need to be there already (morning and evening)?

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## fr33

> Yes.
> 
> Some reptiles grow for as long as they live. They don't stop when they're adults. I assume that must have been the case with large dinosaurs. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong about that.
> 
> ETA: I'm just speculating. There's no reason Adam couldn't have ruled over enormous dinosaurs of any size.


And canines become adults much quicker than either. If you're going to suspend reality to let adult humans be created, it must be applied across the board.

Some might say that plagues and T-Rex's require special instructions to dominate yet no mention can be found from the almighty one.

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## Natural Citizen

> Still, what constitutes a 24 hour day?  A single revolution?  Does the sun need to be there already (morning and evening)?


Ah crap. Here we go again.

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## otherone

> Hold on a second buddy.  If articles about the fairy tale of evolution can be posted here, then other theories can be posted here as well.


Does Jesus know you are calling the Holy Scriptures a "theory"?

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## fr33

> Dominion doesn't mean that a man can jump up on a beast and ride it around for fun. I don't know why you'd even think that.
> 
> Dominion means that animals serve man...that man is the master of this earth in terms of his abilities and faculties.


If men existed during the days of dinosaurs, they were cockroaches to those dinosaurs.

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## heavenlyboy34

Just to nitpick the OP-Adam was formed from "Adama"-clay. (a play on words in Hebrew which they would've found compelling)

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## Natural Citizen

> Just to nitpick the OP-Adam was formed from "Adama"-clay. (a play on words in Hebrew which they would've found compelling)

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## Sola_Fide

> Does Jesus know you are calling the Holy Scriptures a "theory"?


He knows everything.  He is the Creator of everything that exists, visible and invisible.

Also, Jesus specifically said Adam and Eve were the first humans, and the worldwide flood was a real event.

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## otherone

> He knows everything.  He is the Creator of everything that exists, visible and invisible.
> 
> Also, Jesus specifically said Adam and Eve were the first humans, and the worldwide flood was a real event.


So you were lying before when you called Genesis a theory?

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## NativeOne

> If men existed during the days of dinosaurs, they were cockroaches to those dinosaurs.


During days of Job.....Approximately seven to nine thousand years ago...

Job 40:15  Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. 
Job 40:16  Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. 
Job 40:17  He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. 
Job 40:18  His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron. 
Job 40:19  He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him.

Job 40:23  Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth.

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## Sola_Fide

> So you were lying before when you called Genesis a theory?


Obviously I don't believe Genesis can be a theory, but I was being generous with the language.  Like you, I have my theological presuppositions.  

Your theological presupposition of the non-existence of God causes you to have a certain religious view of origins.  So does mine. You are not neutral.

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## fr33

> During days of Job.....Approximately seven to nine thousand years ago...
> 
> Job 40:15  Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. 
> Job 40:16  Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. 
> Job 40:17  He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. 
> Job 40:18  His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron. 
> Job 40:19  He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him.
> 
> Job 40:23  Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth.


Job but no Genesis. Oh well I guess. 

Every animal specifically mentioned in the bible were those alive during the time of the Bronze Age.

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## Natural Citizen

There were giants in those days...

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## James Madison



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## TER

> Right but light is constant so how can you have a day 1?


Below is taken from the book 'Genesis, Creation, and Early Man' by Father Seraphim Rose (an Orthodox Christian monk who lived and died in California and who many the world over, especially in Russia, consider to be a modern Christian Saint).  It is an excellent book in the patristic mindset of the Church, filled with many references from the early Church Fathers.  This 712 page book has recently been reprinted due to high demand.


*Genesis, Creation and Early Man*
Part I. An Orthodox Patristic Commentary of Genesis

Chapter Three.
The Six Days of Creation
(Day by day)
(Genesis 1:1-25; 2:1-3)
1. Introduction

Now let us study the Patristic model of the Six Days of Creation. We will not occupy ourselves with trying to guess "how long" these days were, although by the time we come to the end we will have a pretty good idea of how the Fathers viewed their length. Many fundamentalists think their literal interpretation of Genesis is lost if these days are not accepted as precisely twenty-four hours long; and many others who want to reconcile Genesis with the modern theory of evolution think their hopes rest upon accepting these days as millions or billions of years long so they will accord with the supposed findings of geology. I think we can safely say that both of these views miss the mark.

It is not that these days could not have been twenty-four hours long, if God so willed; one or two Fathers (St. Ephraim the Syrian, for example) even state precisely that they were twenty-four hours long. But most Fathers do not say anything at all on the subject: it was not a subject of debate in their times, and it seems not to have occurred to them to insist on projecting the time scale of our fallen world back to the stupendous and miraculous events of those Six Days.

But if we do not need to define the Six Days of Creation as twenty-four hours long, it is quite impossible for us to regard them as millions or billions of years long - that is, to force them into an evolutionary time scale. The events of the Six Days simply do not fit into the evolutionary picture at all. In Genesis the first living things are grasses and trees upon the dry land; life did not first appear in the sea, as the evolutionary theory would have it; these land plants exist for a whole day (billions of years?) before the sun was created, while in any evolutionary conception the sun precedes the earth itself. Any reasonably objective observer would have to conclude that the Six Days of Creation, if they are a true account and not a product of arbitrary fancy or speculation, simply do not fit into the evolutionary framework, and therefore there is no need to make them billions of years long. We will see below also how the description of these Days by the Holy Fathers makes this interpretation quite impossible. Evolutionary theory is obviously talking about something other than the Six Days of Creation. And in actual fact, no scientific theory can tell us about those Six Days. Science tries to explain (sometimes with more and sometimes with less success) the changes of this world, based on projections of natural processes which can be observed today. But the Six Days of Creation are not a natural process; they are what came before all the world's natural processes began to work. They are God's work; by very definition they are miraculous and do not fit into the natural laws which govern the world we see now. If we can know what happened in those Six Days at all, it is not by scientific projections or speculations, but only by God's revelation. In this respect, modern scientists are no better off than the ancient creators of cosmic speculations and myths. The writers of commentaries on Genesis emphasize this point. St. John Chrysostom writes:

*What does it mean that first there is heaven, and then earth, first the roof and then the foundation? God is not subject to natural necessity; He is not subject to the laws of art. The will of God is the creator and artificer of nature and of art and of everything existing.
*
Speaking of the Fifth Day of Creation, the same Father says:

*Today God goes over to the waters and shows us that from them, by His word and command, there proceeded animate creatures.... What mind, tell me, can understand this miracle?
*
St. Basil teaches in the Hexaemeron that in the Third Day there was no natural necessity for waters to flow downward; this is a law of our own world, but then there was as yet no law, until God's command came:

*Someone may, perhaps, ask this: Why does the Scripture reduce to a command of the Creator that tendency to flow downward which belongs naturally to water?... If water has this tendency by nature, the command ordering the waters to be gathered together into one place would be superfluous.... To this inquiry we say this, that you recognized very well the movements of the water after the command of the Lord, both that it is unsteady and unstable and that it is borne naturally down slopes and into hollows; but how it had any power previous to that, before the motion was engendered in it from this command, you yourself neither know nor have you heard it from one who knew. Reflect that the voice of God makes nature, and the command given at that time to creation provided the future course of action for the creatures.
*
Undoubtedly, here is one of the chief sources of the conflict between scientific theory and religious revelation. During the Six Days nature itself was being made; our present knowledge of natural laws cannot possibly tell us how these laws themselves were made. The very subject of ultimate origins, of beginnings, of the Genesis of all things - is outside the sphere of science. When a scientist enters this realm he guesses and speculates like any ancient cosmologist; and this only distracts him from his serious work of studying the natural processes of this world - it also makes him a competitor of religious revelation, which is the only possible source of our real knowledge of the beginning of things, just as it is our only source of knowledge of the final end of all things. St. Basil writes:

*We are proposing to examine the structure of the world and to contemplate the whole universe, not from the wisdom of the world, but from what God taught His servant when He spoke to him in person and without riddles.
*
If we can humble ourselves enough to know that we can actually know rather little about the details of the Creation of the Six Days, we will have a better chance of understanding what we can about Genesis. The Holy Fathers, and not scientific or cosmological speculations, are our key to understanding the text.

2. General Remarks about the Six Days

What, then, can we say of these Six Days?

_First_: One Orthodox person reflecting on the Six Days very nicely expressed our aim in studying them: we should measure them, not quantitatively, but theologically. The important thing about them is not how long they were, but what happened in them. They are the statement of six immense creative acts of God which produced the universe as we know it. In a moment we will look at these six acts in detail.

_Second_: As we have seen, by their very nature the events of these days are miraculous, are not subject to the laws of nature that now govern the world, and we cannot understand them by projections from our present experience.

_Third_: a point very much emphasized by the Holy Fathers who have written on Genesis: The creative acts of God in the Six Days are sudden, instantaneous.

St. Ephraim the Syrian, who understands the days of Creation to be twenty-four hours long, emphasizes that the creative acts of God in these days do not require twenty-four hours, but only an instant. Thus, concerning the First Day he writes:

*Although both the light and the clouds were created in the twinkling of an eye, still both the day and the night of the First Day continued for twelve hours each.
*
St. Basil the Great likewise emphasizes at various points of his commentary on the Six Days the instantaneous nature of God's creation. On the Third Day of Creation, he writes, At this saying all the dense woods appeared; all the trees shot up.... Likewise, all the shrubs were immediately thick with leaf and bushy; and the so-called garland plants ... all came into existence in a moment of time, although they were not previously upon the earth. "Let the earth bring forth." This brief command was immediately a mighty nature and an elaborate system which brought to perfection more swiftly than our thought the countless properties of plants.

St. Ambrose writes that when Moses says so abruptly "In the beginning God created," he intends to "express the incomprehensible speed of the work." And, having the cosmological speculations of the Greeks in mind, he writes words that apply equally well to the speculations of our own times:

*He (Moses) did not look forward to a late and leisurely creation of the world out of a concourse of atoms.
*
St. Ambrose says further:

*And fittingly (Moses) added: "He created," lest it be thought there was a delay in creation. Furthermore, men would see also how incomparable the Creator was Who completed such a great work in me briefest moment of His creative act, so much so that the effect of His will anticipated the perception of time.
*
St. Athanasius the Great - in arguing against the Arian teaching that Christ is the "beginning" of all things and thus like the creation - sets forth as his understanding of the Six Days of Creation that all things in each of these days were created simultaneously:

*As to the separate stars or the great lights, not this appeared first, and that second, but in one day and by the same command, they were all called into being. And such was the original formation of the quadrupeds, and of birds, and fishes, and cattle, and plants.... No one creature was made before another, but all things originate subsisted at once together upon one and the same command.
*
3. Why Six Days?

We have already quoted St. Ephraim the Syrian, who states that "it is likewise impermissible to say that what seems, according to the account (of Genesis), to have been created in the course of six days, was created in a single instant." The Holy Fathers are quite insistent in their faithfulness to the text of Genesis: when the text says "day," they find it impermissible to understand some indefinitely long epoch, since God's creative acts are instantaneous; but they also find it impermissible to interpret these Six Days as merely some literary device to express a totally instantaneous creation. Although each creative act is instantaneous, the whole creation consists of an orderly sequence of these creative acts.

St. Gregory the Theologian writes:

*To the days (of creation) is added a certain firstness, secondness, thirdness, and so on to the seventh day of rest from works, and by these days is divided all that is created, being brought into order by unutterable laws, but not produced in an instant, by the Almighty Word, for Whom to think or to speak means already to perform the deed. If man appeared in the world last, honored by the handiwork and image of God, this is not in the least surprising; since for him, as for a king, the royal dwelling had to be prepared and only then was the king to be led in, accompanied by all creatures.
*

In the same vein St. John Chrysostom writes:

*The Almighty right hand of God and His limitless wisdom would have had no difficulty in creating everything in a single day. And what do I say, in a single day? - in an instant. But since He created everything that exists not for His own benefit, because He needs nothing, being All-sufficient unto Himself, on the contrary He created everything in His love of mankind and goodness, and so He creates in parts and offers us by the mouth of the blessed Prophet a clear teaching of what is created so that we, having found out about this in detail, would not fall under the influence of those who are drawn away by human reasonings... And why, you will say, was man created afterwards, if he surpassed all these creatures? For a good reason. When a king intends to enter a city, his armsbearers and others must go ahead, so that the king might enter chambers already prepared for him. Precisely thus did God now, intending to place as it were a king and master over everything earthly, at first arrange all this adornment, and only then did He create the master (man).*

St. Gregory of Nyssa repeats this same teaching that man, as king, appeared only after his dominion had been prepared for him; but he also has another, more mystical interpretation of the sequence of the Six Days which some have tried to interpret as an expression of the theory of evolution. Let us therefore look closely at this teaching. He writes:

*Scripture informs us that the Deity proceeded by a sort of graduated and ordered advance to the creation of man. After the foundations of the universe were laid, as the history records, man did not appear on the earth at once; but the creation of the brutes preceded him, and the plants preceded them. Thereby Scripture shows that the vital forces blended with the world of matter according to a gradation; first, it infused itself into insensate nature; and in continuation of this advanced into the sentient world; and then ascended to intelligent and rational beings.... The creation of man is related as coming last, as of one who took up into himself every single form of life, both that of plants and that which is seen in brutes. His nourishment and growth he derives from vegetable life; for even in vegetables such processes are to be seen when aliment is being drawn in by their roots and given off in fruit and leaves. His sentient organization he derives from the brute creation. But his faculty of thought and reason is incommunicable, and is a peculiar gift in our nature.... It is not possible for this reasoning faculty to exist in the life of the body without existing by means of sensations, and since sensation is already found subsisting in the brute creation, necessarily, as it were, by reason of this one condition, our soul has touch with the other things which are knit up with it; and these are all those phenomena within us that we call "passions."
*
At the end of another description in a different book, St. Gregory concludes:

*If, therefore, Scripture tells us that man was made last, after every animate thing, the lawgiver (Moses) is doing nothing else than declaring to us the doctrine of the soul, considering that what is perfect comes last, according to a certain necessary sequence in the order of things.... Thus we may suppose that nature makes an ascent as it were by steps - I mean the various properties of life - from the lower to the perfect form.
*

This is one of the very few passages in the writings of the Holy Fathers which believers in the evolutionary cosmogony find sympathetic to their views. It speaks of an "ascent by steps ... from the lower to the perfect form," and states that man somehow "partakes" in the life or the lower creation. But the evolutionary theory of origins requires much more than these general views, which no one will dispute. The theory of evolution requires that man be shown to be a descendant or the lower creation, to have "evolved" out of it. In a later lecture we will look losely at what the Fathers say of man's origin. Here we will only say that St. Gregory not only says nothing whatever that indicates he believed such a view, but other of his own views contradict it. Thus, he agrees with the rest of the Fathers who have written on Genesis that God's creation is instantaneous; in this same treatise he says that "every hillside and slope and hollow were crowned with young grass, and with the varied produce of the trees, just risen from the ground, yet shot up at once into their perfect beauty," and that "the creation is, so to say, made offhand by the Divine power, existing at once on His command."

Further, St. Gregory states specifically that the one reason human nature has contact with the lower creation is because it shares the same sentient nature; it comes, indeed, from the same earth the lower creatures also sprang from. It is a totally arbitrary addition to the Saint's meaning to insist that this means man "descended" from the brute creation; in this case, indeed, it would be required also that he (and the brutes) descended from the vegetable creation, since he has something of their nature also within himself. But evolutionary theory teaches, not that animals "evolved" from plants, but that the two kingdoms are separate and parallel branches from a common primitive ancestor.

St. Gregory's "ascent by steps," therefore, does not at all show the chronological descent of man from plants and animals, but only shows his kinship with the lower creation through sharing the nutritive and sentient nature which all earthborn creatures have, to the degree God has given it to them. He is describing, not the history of man, but his nature.

We will see more specifically below what St. Gregory actually thought about the "mixing of natures" which is implied in the evolutionary theory.

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## Sola_Fide

> 


Actually, I had you in mind when I posted this.  I was hoping you would comment on how the article shows that the only exegetically sound way to read the Genesis account is literal days.

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## James Madison

> *Actually, I had you in mind when I posted this*.  I was hoping you would comment on how the article shows that the only exegetically sound way to read the Genesis account is literal days.


Awww, how flattering.

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## TER

below is listed Chapter 2 (SORRY FOR THE LENGTH!)

*Genesis, Creation and Early Man*
Part I. An Orthodox Patristic Commentary of Genesis

Chapter Two
The Six Days of Creation
Let us turn now to the text of Genesis and see briefly what God brought into being during the Six Days of Creation:

1. The First Day (Genesis 1:1-5)
*1:1 In the beginning...*

This book is about the very first things in the world. But there can also be a mystical significance to the words, as St. Ambrose teaches:

*A beginning in a mystical sense is denoted by the statement: I am the first and the last, the beginning and the end (Apoc. 1:8).... In truth, He Who is the beginning of all things by virtue of His Divinity is also the end.... Therefore, in this beginning, that is, in Christ, God created heaven and earth, because all things were made through Him and without Him was made nothing that was made (John 1:3).
*
The succeeding acts of creation begin with the words: "And God said." St. Basil asks the meaning of this, and answers it for us:

*Let us inquire how God speaks. Is it in our manner?... Does He manifest His hidden thought by striking the air with the articulate movement of the voice? Surely, it is fantastic to say that God needs such a roundabout way for the manifestation of His thoughts. Or, is it not more in conformity with true religion to say that the Divine will joined with the first impulse of His intelligence is the Word of God? [i.e., Christ]. The Scripture delineates Him in detail in order that it may show that God wished the creation not only to be accomplished, but also to be brought to this birth through some co-worker. It could have related everything fully as it began, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," then "He created light," next, "He created the firmament." But now, introducing God as commanding and speaking, it indicates silently Him to Whom He gives the command and to Whom He speaks.... This way of speaking has been wisely and skillfully employed so as to rouse our mind to an inquiry of the Person to Whom the words are directed.
*
And so we see Christ is the Creator, as is also stated by St. John the Evangelist: "In the beginning was the Word ... all things were made through Him and without Him was made nothing that was made" (John 1:1, 3). St. Paul teaches the same thing: "God ... created all things by Jesus Christ" (Eph. 3:9); "by Him (Christ) were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by Him and for Him" (Col. 1:16).

Thus, in traditional Orthodox iconography of the creation we see not Michelangelo's old man (the Father) creating Adam (as in the fresco in the Sistine Chapel), but Christ. Of course, it is the Trinity as a whole that creates: the Father commands, the Son creates, and in a moment we will see the Spirit participating in this work, as he "moves" or "hovers" over the waters. Of this St. Ephraim the Syrian writes:

*It was fitting for the Holy Spirit to hover as a proof that in creative power He is equal to the Father and the Son. For the Father uttered, the Son created, and it was fitting for the Spirit also to offer His work. And this He did by hovering, thereby clearly showing that all was brought into being and accomplished by the Trinity.
*

*1:1-2 God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was form and void (Septuagint: invisible and unfinished).
*
St. Basil asks:

*How is it, if both the heavens and the earth were of equal honor, that the heavens were brought to perfection and the earth is still imperfect and unfinished? Or, in short, what was the lack of preparation of the earth? And for what reason was it invisible? Surely, the perfect condition of the earth consists in its state of abundance: the budding of all sorts of plants, the putting forth of the lofty trees both fruitful and barren, the freshness and fragrance of flowers, and whatever things appeared on earth a little later by the command of God to adorn their mother. Since as yet there was nothing of this, the Scripture reasonably spoke of it as incomplete. We might say the same also about the heavens; that they were not yet brought to perfection themselves, nor had they received their proper adornment, since they were not yet lighted around by the moon nor the sun, nor crowned by the choirs of the stars. For, these things had not yet been made. Therefore, you will not err from the truth if you say that the heavens also were incomplete.
*
St. Ambrose speaks of this work of the First Day as the "foundation" of the world: The good architect lays the foundation first, and afterwards, when the foundation has been laid, plots the various parts of the building, one after the other, and then adds thereto the ornamentation.... Why did not God ... grant to the elements at the same time as they arose their appropriate adornments, as if He, at the moment of creation, were unable to cause the heavens immediately to gleam with studded stars and the earth to be clothed with flowers and fruit? That could very well have happened. Yet Scripture points out that things were first created and afterwards put in order, lest it be supposed that they were not actually created and that they had no beginning, just as if the nature of things had been, as it were, generated from the beginning and did not appear to be something added afterwards.

St. Ephraim says:

*He said this desiring to show that emptiness preceded the natures (of things)... There was then only the earth, and there was nothing beside it.
*
*1:2 And darkness was upon the face of the deep.
*
The waters of the "deep" were created together with the earth and completely submerged the earth. This is the cause of its unfinished appearance. The Fathers assume there was a certain light created with the heavens, since the heavens are the region of light; but if so the clouds covering the earth prevented its reaching the earth. St. Ephraim writes:

*If everything created (whether its creation is mentioned or not) was created in six days, then the clouds were created on the first day.... For everything had to be created in six days.
*
(This is another indication, incidentally, that the work of the Six Days is distinct from the continuous creative work of God after that, and that we cannot understand it by projecting back from our present experience.)

St. Ambrose specifically rejects the opinion that the "darkness" here refers allegorically to powers of evil.

*1:2 And the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters.
*
Here we see the activity of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity in die creation. St. Ambrose writes:

*There was still to come the plenitude of the operation in the Spirit, as it is written: "By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established and all the power of them by the Spirit of His mouth" (Ps. 32, 6)... The Spirit fittingly moved over the earth, destined to bear fruit, because by the aid of the Spirit it held the seeds of new birth which were to germinate according to the words of the Prophet: "Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created and Thou shah renew the face of the earth" (Ps. 103:32).
*
St. Ephraim gives us a homey image of the activity of the Spirit on the First Day:

*[The Holy Spirit] warmed the waters and made them fertile and capable of birth, like a bird when it sits with its outstretched wings on its eggs and by its warmth gives them warmth and produces fertility in them. This same Holy Spirit represented for us then an image of Holy Baptism, in which by His moving over the waters He gives birth to the children of God.
*
The Holy Spirit also participated in the other days of Creation, for Job speaks of "the Divine Spirit which made me" (Job 33:4).

*1:3 And God said, Let there be light; and there was light.
*
St. Ambrose writes:

*God is the author of light, and the place and cause of darkness is the world. But the good Author uttered the word "light" so that He might reveal the world by infusing brightness therein and thus make its aspect beautiful. Suddenly, then, the air became bright and darkness shrank in terror from the brilliance of the novel brightness. The brilliance of the light which suddenly permeated the whole universe overwhelmed the darkness and, as it were, plunged it into the abyss.
*
St. Ephraim, in harmony with the other Fathers, tells us clearly that this light had nothing to do with the sun, which was created only on the Fourth Day:

The light which appeared on earth was like either a bright cloud, or a rising sun, or the pillar that illumined the Hebrew people in the desert. In any case, the light could not disperse the darkness that embraced everything if it had not extended everywhere either its substance or its rays, like the rising sun. The original light was shed everywhere and was not enclosed in a single definite place; it dispersed the darkness without having any movement; its whole movement consisted in its appearance and disappearance; after its sudden disappearance there came the dominion of night, and with its appearance this dominion ended. Thus the light produced also the three following days.... It aided the conception and bringing forth of everything that the earth was to produce on the third day; as for the sun, when it was established in the firmament, it was to bring to maturity what had already been produced with the aid of the original light.

*1:4 And God saw that the light was good.
*
God calls each stage of His work "good," seeing its perfect and unspoiled nature and, as St. Ambrose teaches, looking forward to the perfection of the whole work:

God, as judge of the whole work, foreseeing what is going to happen as something completed, commends that part of His work which is still in its initial stages, being already cognizant of its termination.... He praises each individual part as befitting what is to come. 1:4-5 And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. St. Basil comments on this passage:

"God separated the light from the darkness." That is, God made their natures incapable of mixing and in opposition, one to the other. For, He divided and separated them with a very great distinction between them. "And God called the light Day and the darkness Night." Now, henceforth, after the creation of the sun, it is day when the air is illuminated by the sun shining on the hemisphere above the earth, and night is the darkness of the earth when the sun is hidden. Yet, it was not at that time according to solar motion, but it was when that first created light was diffused and again drawn in according to the measure ordained by God, that day came and night succeeded.

*1:5 And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
*
St. Basil continues:

*Evening, then, is a common boundary line of day and night; and similarly, morning is the part of night bordering on day. In order, therefore, to give the prerogative of prior generation to the day, Moses mentioned first the limit of the day and then that of the night, as night followed the day. The condition in the world before the creation of light was not night, but darkness; that which was opposed to the day was named night; wherefore it received its name later than the day did.... Why did he say "one" and not "first"? It is more consistent for him who intends to introduce a second and a third and a fourth day, to call the one which begins the series "first." But he said "one" because he was defining the measure of day and night.
*
This First Day of creation (no matter how "long" one may guess it to be) is the beginning of the cycle of seven days (each with its "day" and "night") which continues up to our own days. Those rationalist commentators who see in the "seven days" and the fact that "evening" precedes "morning" merely a projection backwards of later Jewish customs show themselves totally out of harmony with the Patristic way of viewing these things, and they are therefore unable to answer the question: where and why did the Jews derive these customs? In the Patristic view, the revealed text can and does give the literal origins of the world and the reasons for the Jewish customs (which are now Christian - for our church day also begins with Vespers, the evening service).

Thus we have come to the end of "Day One," the First Day of creation. It has established the measure of time for all succeeding ages (because "before" it there was no time; time begins with it). And in another sense also it is a day unlike those that follow it, as St. Ephraim explains:

*Thus, according to the testimony of Scripture, heaven, earth, fire, air, and the waters were created out of nothing; while the light which was created on the First Day and everything else that was created after it were created out of what existed before. For when Moses speaks of what was created out of nothing he uses the word "created" (Hebrew: bara): God created the heavens and the earth. And although it is not written that fire, the waters and the air were created, it is likewise not said that they were produced from what existed earlier. And therefore they also are out of nothing, just as heaven and earth are out of nothing. But when God begins to create out of what already existed, the Scripture uses an expression like this: God said, let there be light, and the rest. And if it is said: God created the great sea monsters, before this the following is said: Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures. Therefore, only the above-named five kinds of creations were created out of nothing, while everything else was created out of what had already been created out of nothing.
*
The "five creations" that St. Ephraim mentions are the "four elements" out of which, according to the definition of ancient science, everything on earth consists, in addition to "heaven." One does not have to accept this particular way of analyzing the creation to see that there is indeed something "fundamental" about the First Day of Creation: it contains the beginnings of everything that is to come after. One might speculate as to where the actual matter came from for the living creatures, the heavenly bodies, and other creations of the next five days: was it newly created out of nothing, or was it really only a transformation of pre-existing matter? But this would be a profitless exercise that would not, in any case, contradict the truth that the basic structure and matter of creation was made on the First Day; the work of the next five days is less "radical" than that of the First Day - it is rather a "shaping" than a "creation" in the strict sense.

The very idea of "creation out of nothing" or "from non-being" sharply distinguishes the Genesis account from that of all pagan myths and speculations about creation. In the latter it is some kind of "demiurge" or "fashioner-god" who forms the world out of already existing matter - which, as the Holy Fathers say, thus is a kind of "god" also. Genesis describes the absolute beginning of the whole world, not its development from something already existing; even the creations of the following five days, as we shall see, although they come out of the matter which has already been created, are something radically new which cannot be understood as a mere development of the first-created matter. The speculations of modern thinkers who try to trace the world back to some ultimately simple matter which develops by itself can be seen to be akin to the ancient pagan speculations; the radicalness of the Genesis explanation is beyond them both-precisely because it comes from God's revelation and not the guesses and projections of men.

The Christian who understands the absoluteness of God's creative work in the Six Days views the present creation with different eyes than does someone who views it as a gradual development or "evolution" from primordial matter (whether the latter is understood as created by God or as self-existing). In the latter view, the world is seen to be "naturally" what it is, and one can trace it back to ever simpler forms, each of which can be understood "naturally"; but in the former view, the view of Genesis, one is placed before the two radical poles of existence: that which now is, and the absolute nothingness from which it came, suddenly and by God's will alone.

There is only one more question for us to ask concerning the First Day: where does the creation of the world of angels fit into it? Moses describes the creation only of the visible world; when was the invisible world of spiritual beings created? Some Fathers think they are included in the creation of "heaven"; others are not so specific, but know that they were also created "in the beginning." St. Basil teaches:

*In fact there did exist something, as it seems, even before this world, which our mind can attain by contemplation, but which has been left uninvestigated because it is not adapted to those who are beginners and as yet infants in understanding. This was a certain condition older than the birth of the world and proper to the supramundane powers, one beyond time, everlasting, without beginning or end. In it the Creator and Producer of all things perfected the works of His art, a spiritual light befitting the blessedness or those who love the Lord, rational and invisible natures, and the whole orderly arrangement of spiritual creatures which surpass our understanding and of which it is impossible even to discover the names. These fill completely the essence of the invisible world.
*
Similarly, St. Ambrose writes:

*The Angels, Dominations, and Powers, although they began to exist at some time, were already in existence when the world was created. For all things "were created, things visible and things invisible, whether Thrones or Dominations or Principalities or Powers. All things," we are told, "have been created through and unto Him" (Col. 1:16).
*
Indeed, God said to Job: "When the stars were made, all My angels praised Me with a loud voice" (Job 38:7, Septuagint). We will see on the Sixth Day how Adam was tempted by satan, and therefore we know that the battle of the proud angels in heaven, as described in the Apocalypse (12:7-8) has already been fought before then, and satan has already "fallen like lightning" (Luke 10:18).

2. The Second Day (Genesis 1:6-8)

*1:6-8 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.
*
Some have tried to find in this passage an "unscientific" view of the heavens, as though Moses believed in a kind of hard crystal dome which the stars are embedded and above which there is a fictitious store of water. But there is nothing so fantastic to be found in this text.

The word "firmament" seems to have two shades of meaning in Genesis, one quite specific and "scientific," the other general. In its general meaning the firmament is more or less synonymous with "heaven" or "sky": the stars are called "lights in the firmament of the heavens" (Gen. 1:14), and the birds fly "across the firmament of the heavens" (Gen. 1:20). We who have lost the specific meaning of "firmament" would omit it in such descriptions and say that stars and birds are both to be seen in the "heavens." The idea that the stars are embedded in crystal spheres is a speculation of ancient pagan thought and does not have to be projected into the inspired text of Genesis.

What, then, is the specific "scientific" meaning of the "firmament" in this text? St. Basil teaches that, even though it is also called "heaven," it is not synonymous with the "heaven" mentioned at the beginning of Genesis.

Since both a second name and a function peculiar to the second heaven was recorded, this is a different one from that recorded in the beginning, one of a more solid nature and furnishing a special service for the universe.... We believe that this word has been assigned for a certain firm nature which is capable of supporting the fluid and unstable water. And, surely, we need not believe, because it seems to have had its origin, according to the general understanding, from water, that it is like either frozen water or some ... translucent stone ... almost like the air in transparency. Now, we compare the firmament to none of these things. Truly, it is peculiar to a childish and simple intellect to hold such notions about the heavens.... We have been taught by the Scripture to permit our mind to invent no fantasy beyond the knowledge that has been granted it....

Not a firm and solid nature, which has weight and resistance, it is not this that the word "firmament" means. In that case the earth would more legitimately be considered deserving of such a name. But, because the nature of the substances lying above is light and rare and imperceptible, He called this (a) firmament, in comparison with those very light substances which are incapable of perception by the senses. Now, imagine some place which tends to separate the moisture, and lets the rare and filtered part pass through into the higher regions, but lets the coarse and earthly part drop below, so that, by the gradual reduction of the liquids, from the beginning to the end the same mild temperature may be preserved.

The "firmament" in Genesis, therefore, is some kind of natural harrier or filter that separates two levels of atmospheric moisture. We do not observe today such a definite phenomenon that we could call a "firmament." Was it perhaps different in the first-formed earth?

St. Basil believes that the function of the "firmament" was to preserve a mild temperature over the whole earth. Now, it so happens that we know of a certain "greenhouse" effect on the earth in prehistoric times: tropical plants and animals have been found in the ice of the far north, indicating that the northern regions were indeed once temperate. Further, in the second chapter of Genesis we are told that before the creation of man, "the Lord had not caused it to rain upon the earth ... but there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground" (Gen. 2:5-6).

The early earth, then, seems to have been a place rather different from the one we know: a place universally temperate, plentiful in moisture which constantly watered an abundant vegetation, which, as we shall see, was all that God intended not only for the food of man, but even of the beasts (Gen. 1:30).

When did this happy situation come to an end? We will soon look at the consequences of the fall of man; but there are indications that the earth even after the fall of man preserved some of the characteristics of the earliest earth. Let us look briefly at what the Scripture says in the light of our scientific knowledge of the atmosphere. The Holy Fathers themselves often applied the scientific knowledge of their times in understanding the Scripture, and we are also permitted to do so - provided only that we do no violence to the text of Scripture and are humble and moderate in our own supposed understanding. The following explanation, therefore, is offered not as dogma but as speculation.

The very phenomenon of rain is not mentioned in the text of Genesis until the time of Noah; and then it is not an ordinary rain but a kind of cosmic catastrophe: "All the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights" (Gen. 7:11-12). Immense - to us, nearly unimaginable - amounts of water were loosed on the earth reducing it virtually to its state on the First Day of creation, when the "deep" covered the earth. The rains we know today could not cause this to happen; but the text describes something even worse: an immense underground supply of water was loosed, and the "firmament" - the atmospheric condition that preserved a permanent reservoir of water in the air, evidently in the form of clouds such as the planet Venus has even now - was literally "broken" and emptied its contents upon the earth.

In this light we can also understand why God gave the rainbow as the sign of His covenant with Noah and all creatures that there would never again be such a flood upon earth. How could the rainbow have been a sign, when supposedly it had existed throughout the centuries before that? Evidently the rainbow then appeared for the first time. The rainbow is formed by the direct rays of the sun upon moisture in the air. If the permanent cloud cover of the earth was dissipated by the breaking of the "firmament," then literally the direct rays of the sun struck the earth for the first time after the Flood. The rainbow had been unknown to man before that - which is why it can now be a sign to man that literally the supply of moisture in the air is limited and cannot cause a universal flood any more.

Some scientists recently have speculated - on different evidence - that the amount of cosmic radiation striking the earth for some reason manifested a striking increase about five thousand years ago. This of course would be true if the waters above the firmament had served as a filter and kept out harmful radiation.

In view of all this, it would seem that the time after the Flood is a whole new epoch in human history. The comparatively "paradisal conditions of the earth up to the time of Noah, when a universal temperateness prevailed over the earth and abundant vegetation supplied the needs of man without the need to eat meat (Noah is the first to receive God's permission to eat flesh; Gen. 9:3), gives way to the harsher post-Flood earth we know, when there is "seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter" (Gen. 8:22), and men no longer live ninde hundred years as did Adam and the early Patriarchs, but very quickly are reduced to the seventy or eighty years which is the general limit of our life even up to now.

3. The Third Day (Genesis 1:9-13)

*1:9-10 And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together He called Seas. And God saw that it was good.
*
On each Day of creation a command is given that becomes the law of nature for all time thereafter. From the First Day, the succession of day and night begins; and from the Third Day, the waters begin their ceaseless movement. Thus, "the element of water was ordered to flow, and it never grows weary when urged on unceasingly by this command."

It is tempting for us, in the pride of our scientific knowledge, to speculate about the how of this event: Did the waters flow into underground reservoirs? Did the land rise up? The Scripture does not say and for this reason the Holy Fathers say little on this subject. St. Ambrose writes:

*What He actually has done, which I have not learned from the clear testimony of Scripture, I pass over as a mystery, lest, perchance, that stir up other questions starting even from this point. Nevertheless, I maintain in accordance with the Scriptures, that God can extend the low-lying regions and the open plains, as He has said: "I will go before thee and make level the mountains" (Is. 45:2).
*
On this same question of the "how" of creation St. Gregory of Nyssa teaches:

*As for the question, how any single thing came into existence, we must banish it altogether from our discussion. Even in the case of things which are quite within the grasp of our understanding and of which we have sensible perception, it would be impossible for the speculative reason to grasp the "how" of the production of the phenomenon; so much so, that even inspired and saintly men have deemed such questions insoluble. For instance, the Apostle says, "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen are not made of things which do appear" (Heb. 11:3).... While the Apostle affirms that it is an object of his faith that it was by the will of God that the world itself and all which is therein was framed,... he has on the other hand left out of the investigation the "how" of this framing.... Let us, following the example of the Apostle, leave the question of the "how" in each created thing, without meddling with it at all, but merely observing incidentally that the movement of God's will becomes at any moment that He pleases a fact, and the intention becomes at once realized in nature.
*
In all that has to do with the Six Days of Creation, therefore, the Holy Fathers offer few guesses (and they are always tentative) regarding how God created; and we likewise should refrain from projecting our knowledge of the "how" of the present creation (to the small extent that we know it) back to the first-created world.

The dry land appeared at the command of God, and not by some natural process. St. Ambrose writes:

*It was provided that the earth would, to all appearance, have been dry by the hand of God rather than by the sun, for the earth actually became dry before the sun was created. Wherefore, David, too, distinguished the sea from the land, referring to the Lord God: "For the sea is His and He made it, and His hands made the dry land" (Ps. 94:5).
*
*1:11-13 And God said, Let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth. And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a third day.
*
The Holy Fathers are unanimous in emphasizing the miraculous nature of the creation of the Third Day. St. Basil teaches:

*"Let the earth bring forth herbs." And in the briefest moment of time the earth, beginning with germination in order that it might keep the laws of the Creator, passing through every form of increase, immediately brought the shoots to perfection. The meadows were deep with the abundant grass; the fertile plains, rippling with standing crops, presented the picture of a swelling sea with its moving heads of grain. And every herb and every kind of vegetable and whatever shrubs and legumes there were, rose from the earth at that time in all profusion.... "And the fruit tree," He said, "that bears fruit containing seed of its own kind and of its own likeness on the earth. At this saying all the dense woods appeared; all the trees shot up, those which are wont to rise to the greatest height, the firs, cedars, cypresses, and pines; likewise, all the shrubs were immediately thick with leaf and bushy; and the so-called garland plants - the rose bushes, myrtles, and laurels-all came into existence in a moment f time, although they were not previously upon the earth, each o with its own peculiar nature.
*
St. Ephraim the Syrian states precisely:

*The herbs, at the time of their creation, were the productions of a single instant, but in appearance they appeared the productions of months. Likewise the trees, at the time of their creation, were the productions of a single day, but in their perfection and fruits, which weighed down the branches, they appeared the productions of years.
*
St. Gregory of Nyssa also emphasizes that what was created by God was not merely seeds or a potentiality for growth, but the actual creations we know; seeds come from those first-created plants:

*We learn from Scripture in the account of the first creation, that first the earth brought forth "the green herb," and that then from this plant seed was yielded, from which, when it was shed on the ground, the same form of the original plant again sprang up.... In the beginning, we see, it was not an ear rising from a grain, but a grain coming from an ear, and, after that, the ear grows round the grain.
*
Plants and trees appeared on earth, as the Fathers repeat again and again, before the very existence of the sun. St. John Chrysostom writes:

*(Moses) shows you that everything was accomplished before the creation of the sun, so that you might ascribe the ripening of the fruits not to it, but to the Creator of the universe.
*
St. Basil states:

*The adornment of the earth is older than the sun, that those who have been misled may cease worshipping the sun as the origin of life.
*
Ambrose waxes eloquent on this subject:

*Before the light of the sun shall appear, let the green herb be born, let its light be prior to that of the sun. Let the earth germinate before ceives the fostering care of the sun, lest there be an occasion for human error to grow. Let everyone be informed that the sun is not the author of vegetation.. . . How can the sun give the faculty of life growing plants, when these have already been brought forth by the life-giving creative power of God before the sun entered into such a life as this? The sun is younger than the green shoot, younger than the green plant.
*
The vegetation and trees brought forth seeds, "each according to its kind." This expression of Scripture is a key one in Patristic thought; we will devote a lengthy discussion to it under the Fifth Day of creation, when living creatures were brought forth likewise "each according to its kind."

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## TER

4. The Fourth Day (Genesis 1:14-19)

*1:14-19 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and let them be lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth. And it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; He made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.
*
The Fourth Day of creation is a source of great embarrassment for those who would like to fit the Six Days into an evolutionary framework. There is absolutely no way this can be done if the sun was actually created on the Fourth Day.

For this reason, such apologists for the evolutionary interpretation have to believe that the sun was really created on the First Day with the heavens, but only appeared on the Fourth Day - apparently after the cloud covering of the earth during the first three days had lifted.

But we should remind ourselves once more that the first chapters of Genesis are not an account of the natural development of the earth accorrding to the laws now governing this development, but an account of the miraculous beginnings of all things. We are not free to rearrange the Days of Genesis to fit our theories; we must rather humble our understanding so as to comprehend what the sacred text actually says. And here as always the Holy Fathers are our key to this comprehension. How did they understand the Fourth Day?

The Holy Fathers are unanimous in affirming that the sun and the heavenly luminaries were created on the Fourth Day; they did not merely appear then. There is no reason why, if the text of Genesis permitted it, the Fathers could not have accepted the seemingly more "natural explanation" that the light of the sun illuminated the first three days of creation, but that the orb of the sun only became visible from earth on the Fourth Day. That they universally reject this explanation can only mean that the text of Genesis does not allow it.

St. John Chrysostom writes: *"He created the sun on the Fourth Day so that you might not think that it produces the day."*

St. Basil teaches:

*The heavens and the earth had come first; after them, light had been created, day and night separated, and in turn, the firmament and dry land revealed. Water had been collected into a fixed and definite gathering. The earth had been filled with its proper fruits; for, it had brought forth countless kinds of herbs, and had been adorned with varied species of plants. However, the sun did not yet exist, nor the moon, lest men might call the sun the first cause and rather of light, and lest they who are ignorant of God might deem it the producer of what grows from the earth.... If the creation of light had preceded, why, now, is the sun in turn said to have been made to give light?.... At the time (the First Day) the actual nature of light was introduced, but now this solar body has been made ready to be a vehicle for that first-created light.... And do not tell me that it is impossible for these to be separated. I certainly do not say that the separation of light from the solar body is possible for you and me, but that that which we are able to separate in thought can also be separated in actuality by the Creator of its nature.. "Let them serve," He says, "for the fixing of days," not for making days, but for ruling the days. For, day and night are earlier than the generation of the luminaries.
*
St. Ambrose makes a special emphasis on this point:

*Look first upon the firmament of heaven which was made before the sun; look first upon the earth which began to be visible and was already formed before the sun put in its appearance; look at the plants of the earth which preceded in time the light of the sun. The bramble preceded the sun; the blade of grass is older than the moon. Therefore, do not believe that object to be a god to which the gifts of God are seen to be preferred. Three days have passed. No one, meanwhile, has looked for the sun, yet the brilliance of light has been in evidence everywhere. For the day, too, has its light which is itself the precursor of the sun.
*
The idea that life on earth from the beginning was dependent on the sun, and even that the earth itself comes from the sun - is a recent idea that is nothing but the sheerest guess; it even has no direct connection with the truth or falsity of the so-called evolution of life on earth. Because men in recent centuries have been looking for a "new and "natural" explanation of the worlds origin, having rejected the explanation that comes from Divine revelation, it has seemed a matter of course that the sun - so much larger and astronomically more significant than the earth, and the center of the earths orbit-should precede the earth, rather than the other way around.

But Divine revelation, as interpreted by the Holy Fathers, tells us the contrary: that the earth comes first, both in time and in significance, and the sun comes second. If our minds were not so chained to the intellectual fashions of the times, if we were not so fearful of being thought "behind the times," we would not have such difficulty in opening our minds to this alternative explanation of the world's beginnings.

In the Scriptural-Patristic view the earth, as the home of man, the pinnacle of God's creation, is the center of the universe. Everything else - no matter what the scientific explanation of its present state and movement, or the physical immensity of it in comparison to the earth - is secondary, and was made for the sake of the earth, that is, for man. Our God is of such power and majesty that we need not doubt that in a single momentary exercise of His creative might He brought into being this whole earth - large to us, but only a speck in the whole universe - and that in another moment of His power He made the whole immensity of the stars of heaven. He could do vastly more than that if He willed; in the inspired text of Genesis He has left us the barest outline of what He did do, and this account is not required to accord with our human speculations and guesses.

In our days it has become fashionable and easy to believe that everything "evolved," by absolutely uniform laws which we can now observe, from a primordial blob of energy or matter; if one needs "God" to explain anything, it is only to be the "creator" of this blob, or the initiator of the "big bang" that supposedly has produced everything there is. Today it requires a broader mind, less chained to "public opinion," to begin to see the enormity of the creative acts of God as described in Genesis. The Holy Fathers - the most "sophisticated" and "scientific" minds of their time - can be the unchainers of our fettered minds.

But surely, it might be asked, the creations of God must make sense from the "natural" point of view also. Why, therefore, did God create such an enormous body as the sun to serve such a small body as the earth? Couldn't He have conserved this energy and made a sun more in accordance with the scale of the earth?

One could, of course, conceive of a sun much smaller than the one we know and much closer to the earth, while preserving its apparent size as seen from the earth. But such a sun would expend its energy many times more rapidly than our present sun does. Evidently God made the sun the size and the distance from earth it needs to have if it is to give to earth the amount of light and heat it requires to support life to the end of this age, when the sun shall be darkened (Matt. 24:29).

We may also see another, a mystical reason, for the fact that the light precedes the sun in the days of creation. Here, admittedly, we have no Fathers to quote, and we offer this interpretation as our own opinion. We will see below that the separation of man into male and female was not part of the original "image" in which God created him; and we know that it will not be part of man's nature in the eternal kingdom of heaven, for in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven (Matt. 22:30). Rather, God made the division into male and female foreseeing the fall of man and that the increase of mankind would require a passionate mode of generation.

Might it not be, then, that the sun and moon are also not part of God's original "image" of His creation, but were only created to mark the days and months and years of man's fallen estate? The original light, created on the First Day, had no need of a body to contain it. At the end of the world shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven (Matt. 24:29); and in the kingdom of heaven, as on the First Day of Creation, there will be once more light without the sun and moon - for the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it; for the glory of the Lord did lighten it (Apoc. 21:23).

But these are mysteries at which we can do no more than guess.

5. The Fifth Day (Genesis 1:20-23)

*1:20-23 And God said, Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the firmament of the heavens. So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth. And there was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
*
In his commentary on the Fifth Day of Creation, St. John Chrysostom emphasizes the preciseness and accurateness of the order in which the creation is described.

*The blessed Moses, instructed by the Spirit of God, teaches us with such detail ... so that we might clearly know both the order and the way of the creation of each thing. If God had not been concerned for our salvation and had not guided the tongue of the Prophet, it would have been sufficient to say that God created the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, and living creatures, without indicating either the order of the days or what was created earlier and what later.... But he distinguishes so clearly both the order of creation and the number of days, and instructs us about everything with great condescension, in order that we, coming to know the whole truth, would no longer heed the false teachings of those who speak of everything according to their own reasonings, but might comprehend the unutterable power of our Creator.
*
Thus, on the Fifth Day, he writes:

*Just as He said of the earth only: "Let it bring forth," and there appeared a great variety of flowers, herbs, and seeds, and all occurred by His word alone, so here also He said: "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the firmament of the heavens" - and instantly there were so many kinds of crawling things, such a variety of birds, that one cannot number them in words.
*
St. Basil writes:

*All water was in eager haste to fulfill the command of its Creator, and the great and ineffable power of God immediately produced an efficacious and active life in creatures of which one would not even be able to enumerate the species, as soon as the capacity for propagating living creatures came to the waters through His command.
*
And St. Ambrose:

*At this command the waters immediately poured forth their offspring. The rivers were in labor. The lakes produced their quota of life. The sea itself began to bear all manner of reptiles.... We are unable to record the multiplicity of the names of all those species which by Divine command were brought to life in a moment of time. At the same instant substantial form and the principle of life were brought into existence.... The whale, as well as the frog, came into existence at the same time by the same creative power.
*
Here, as in the creation of all living things, God creates the first of each kind:

*God orders the firstlings of each kind to be brought forth, seeds, as it were, for nature; and their numbers are controlled by successive progeny, whenever they must increase and become numerous (St. Basil).
*
Here, therefore, let us examine the meaning of the expression, repeated on each of the three days in which life is created, "each according to its kind."

There can be no doubt whatever that the Holy Fathers understood, clearly and unanimously, that on these three days God created all the kinds of creatures that we know today. This can be seen in their often-repeated assertions that God creates immediately and instantly, that it is His word alone that brings the creatures into being, that it is not a natural property of the waters or earth to bring forth life. On the latter point St. Basil writes (speaking of the Sixth Day):

*When He said: "Let it bring forth," (the earth) did not produce what was stored up in it, but He Who gave the command also bestowed upon it the power to bring forth. Neither did the earth, when it heard, "Let it bring forth vegetation and the fruit trees," produce plants which it had hidden in it; nor did it send up to the surface the palm or the oak or the cypress which had been hidden somewhere down below in its womb. On the contrary, it is the Divine Word that is the origin of all things made. "Let the earth bring forth"; not, let it put forth what it has, but, let it acquire what it does not have, since God is enduing it with the power of active force.
*
The Holy Fathers have a very definite teaching on the "kinds" of creation. Let us only bear in mind here that we need not define precisely the limits of these "kinds." The "species" of modern taxonomy (the science of classification) are sometimes arbitrary and do not necessarily correspond to the "kinds" of Genesis; but in general one might say that the Fathers understand as included in a "kind" those creatures capable of producing a fertile offspring, as will be seen in what follows.

St. Basil teaches that the "kinds" of Genesis (except, of course, for those that may have become extinct) maintain their nature to the end of time:

*There is nothing truer than this, that each plant either has seed or there exists in it some generative power. And this accounts for the expression "of its own kind." For the shoot of the reed is not productive of an olive tree, but from the reed comes another reed; and from seeds spring plants related to the seeds sown. Thus, what was put forth by the earth in its first generation has been preserved until the present time, since the kinds persisted through constant reproduction.
*
And further:

*The nature of existing objects, set in motion by one command, passes through creation without change, by generation and destruction, preserving the succession of the kinds through resemblance, until it reaches the very end. It begets a horse as the successor of a horse, a lion of a lion, and an eagle of an eagle; and it continues to preserve each of the animals by uninterrupted successions until the consummation of the universe. No length of time causes the specific characteristics of the animals to be corrupted or extinct, but, as if established just recently, nature, ever fresh, moves along with time.
*
Similarly, St. Ambrose teaches:

*In the pine cone nature seems to express an image of itself; it preserves its peculiar properties which it received from that Divine and celestial command, and it repeats in the succession and order of the years its generation until the end of time is fulfilled.
*
And the same Father says even more decisively:

*The Word of God permeates every creature in the constitution of the world. Hence, as God had ordained, all kinds of living creatures were quickly produced from the earth. In compliance with a fixed law they all succeed each other from age to age according to their aspect and kind. The lion generates a lion; the tiger, a tiger; the ox, an ox; the swan, a swan; and the eagle, an eagle. What was once enjoined became in nature a habit for all time. Hence the earth has not ceased to offer the homage of her service. The original species of liv-mg creatures is reproduced for future ages by successive generations of its kind.
*
The attempts of breeders, both of animals and plants, in all ages to make a new species by mating individuals of different species produces (when it succeeds) a result that only proves the Patristic maxim of the constancy of species: these "hybrids" are sterile and cannot reproduce themselves. St. Ambrose uses this example to warn men against "unnatural unions" which go against the laws which God established in the Days of Creation:

*What pure and untarnished generations follow without intermingling one after another, so that a thymallus produces a thymallus; a sea-wolf, a sea-wolf. The sea-scorpion, too, preserves unstained its marriage bed.... Fish know nothing of union with alien species. They do not have unnatural betrothals such as are designedly brought about between animals of two different species as, for instance, the donkey and the mare, or again the female donkey and the horse, both being examples of unnatural union. Certainly there are cases in which nature suffers more in the nature of defilement rather than that of injury to the individual. Man as an abettor of hybrid barrenness is responsible for this. He considers a mongrel animal more valuable than one of a genuine species. You mix together alien species and you mingle diverse seeds.
*
The distinctness and integrity of the "seeds" of each of the "kinds" of creation is so much a part of Scriptural and Patristic thought that it serves in the Gospel as the basis for the Parable of our Lord regarding the distinctness of good and evil, virtue and sin. St. Ambrose uses this parable (Matt. 13:24-30) to illustrate the integrity of the seeds of each "kind":

*There is no danger that the precept of God, to which nature has accustomed itself, may become void in future time by a failure of propagation, since today the integrity of the stock is still preserved in the seeds. We know that cockle and the other alien seeds which often are interspersed among fruits of the earth are called "weeds" in the Gospel. These, however, belong to a special species and have not degenerated into another species by a process of mutation from the seed of the wheat plant. The Lord told us that this is so when He aid' "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while men were asleep, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat." We gather from this that weeds and wheat certainly seem to be distinct both in name and in kind. Hence, the servants, too, said to the householder, "Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? How then does it have weeds?" He said to them, "An enemy hath done this." One is the seed of the devil; the other, that of Christ which is sown in accordance with justice. Therefore, the Son of Man sowed one and the devil sowed the other. For that reason the nature of each is distinct, since the sowers are opposed. Christ sows the kingdom of God, whereas the devil sows sin. How, therefore, can this kingdom be of one and the same race as sin? "This is the kingdom of God," He says, "as though a man should cast seed into the earth."
*
Just as the distinction of species is related to the distinction between good and evil, so is the confusion of species related to moral relativity. It is certainly well known how believers in the relativity of good and evil, of virtue and vice, make use of the cosmological theory of universal evolution to defend their belief as "scientific" and "factual": if man was "once" a lower animal and is "evolving" into something else, then how can his inconstant nature be compelled to obey commandments given at only one stage of his "development"? Marxist atheism bound itself to this theory of evolution from the very beginning and to this day preaches it as one of the cardinal doctrines of its relativistic philosophy.

The idea of the consistency of nature and the integrity and distinctness of its "kinds" runs throughout Patristic literature. It serves as a model, for example, of the resurrection of the human body. St. Ambrose writes, in his treatise on the resurrection:

*Nature in all its produce remains consistent with itself.... Seeds of one kind cannot be changed into another kind of plant, nor bring forth produce differing from its own seeds, so that men should spring from serpents and flesh from teeth; how much more, indeed, is it to be believed that whatever has been sown rises again in its own nature, and that crops do not differ from their seed, that soft things do not spring from hard, nor hard from soft, nor is poison changed into blood; but that flesh is restored from flesh, bone from bone, blood from blood, the humors of the body from humors. Can ye then, ye heathen, who are able to assert a change, deny a restoration of the nature?
*
In a similar view, St. Gregory of Nyssa writes:

*Whereas we learn from Scripture in the account of the first Creation, that first the earth brought forth "the green herb" (as the narrative says), and that then from this plant seed was yielded, from which, when it was shed on the ground, the same form of the original plant again sprang up, the Apostle, it is to be observed, declares that this very same thing happens in the Resurrection also; and so we learn from him the fact, not only that our humanity will be then changed into something nobler, but also that what we have therein to expect is nothing else than that which was at the beginning.
*
A strange parallel to the modern theory of universal evolution may be seen in the ancient pagan teaching of the transmigration of souls (reincarnation). The reaction of the Holy Fathers to this idea, which they universally condemned, shows how concerned they were to preserve the orderliness of creation and the distinctness of its kinds of creatures. St. Gregory of Nyssa writes:

*Those who would have it that the soul migrates into natures divergent from each other seems to me to obliterate all natural distinctions; to blend and confuse together, in every possible respect, the rational, the irrational, the sentient, and the insensate; if, that is, all these are to pass into each other, with no distinct natural order secluding them from mutual transition. To say that one and the same soul, on account of a particular environment of body, is at one time a rational and intellectual soul, and that then it is caverned along with the reptiles, or herds with the birds, or is a beast of burden, or a carnivorous one, or swims in the deep; or even drops down to an insensate thing, so as to strike out roots or become a complete tree, producing buds on branches, and from those buds a flower, or a thorn, or a fruit edible or noxious - to say this, is nothing short of making all things the same and believing that one single nature runs through all beings; that there is a connection between them which blends and confuses hopelessly all the marks by which one could be distinguished from another.
*
The idea that "one single nature runs through all beings," of course, lies at the heart of the theory of universal evolution. Erasmus Darwin (the grandfather of Charles) had already pointed scientific speculation in this direction at the end of the eighteenth century. Such an idea is profoundly alien to Scriptural and Patristic thought.

6. The Sixth Day (Genesis 1:24-31)

*1:24-25 And God said, Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds. And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the cattle according to their kinds, and everything that creeps upon the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
*
The teaching of the Holy Fathers on the creation of the land animals on the Sixth Day does little more than repeat what has already been said about the other living creatures. Thus, St. Ephraim writes:

*The earth at God's command immediately brought forth creeping things, beasts of the field, creatures of prey, and domestic animals, as many as were necessary for the service of him who, on that very day, transgressed the commandment of his Lord.
*
St. Basil teaches:

*The soul of brute beasts did not emerge after having been hidden in the earth, but it was called into existence at the time of the command.
*
With this act of creation, all is ready for the appearance of man, who is to be lord over it all. But this magnificent creation is not merely for the practical use of man. There is something mystical in it; being the good creation of the All-good God, it can raise our minds to Him. St. John Chrysostom writes:

*God created everything not only for our use, but also that we, seeing the great wealth of his creations, might be astonished at the might of the Creator and might understand that all this was created with wisdom and unutterable goodness for the honor of man, who was to appear.
*
St. Basil, marvelling at the grandeur of God's creation, says:

*Let us glorify the Master Craftsman for all that has been done wisely and skillfully; and from the beauty of the visible things let us form an idea of Him Who is more than beautiful; and from the greatness of these perceptible and circumscribed bodies let us conceive of Him Who is infinite and immense and Who surpasses all understanding in the plenitude of His power. For even if we are ignorant of things made, yet, at least, that which in general comes under our observation is so wonderful that even the most acute mind is shown to be at a loss as regards the least of the things in the world, either in the ability to explain it worthily or to render due praise to the Creator, to Whom be all glory, honor, and power forever.
*
God made the world, as St. John Damascene teaches, because, "not ontent to contemplate Himself, by a superabundance of goodness He saw fit that there should be some things to benefit by and participate in this goodness."

Perhaps no part of Scripture expresses so well the awe-inspiring majesty of God in His creation, and man's nothingness in comparison, as does the passage in which God speaks to Job out of the whirlwind:

*Where wast thou when I founded the earth? Tell me now, if thou hast knowledge, who set the measures of it, if thou knowest? Or who stretched a line upon it? On what are its rings fastened? And who is he that laid the cornerstone upon it? When the stars were made, all My angels praised Me with a loud voice. And I shut up the sea with gates, when it rushed out, coming forth out of its mother's womb. And I made a cloud its clothing, and swathed it in mist. And I set bounds to it, surrounding it with bars and gates. And I said to it, Hitherto shalt thou come, but thou shalt not go beyond, but thy waves shall be confined within thee. Or did I order the morning light in thy time; and did the morning star then first see his appointed place; to lay hold of the extremities of the earth, to cast out the ungodly out of it? Or didst thou take clay of the ground, and form a living creature, and set it with the power of speech upon the earth? (Job 38:4-14, Septuagint).
*
The Genesis account of the creation of man is given in two accounts, those of chapter one and chapter two; these we shall examine in the next chapter.

*2:1-3 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all His work which He had done in creation.
*
Of this, God's "sabbath" rest from creation, St. John Chrysostom writes:

*The Divine Scripture indicates here that God rested from His works; but in the Gospel Christ says: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work" (John 5:17). In comparing these utterances, is there not a contradiction to be found in them? May it not be so; in the words of the Divine Scripture there is no contradiction whatever. When the Scripture here says: "God rested from all His works," it thereby instructs us that on the Seventh Day He ceased to create and to bring out of nonexistence into existence; but when Christ says: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," it thereby indicates to us His uninterrupted Providence, and it calls "work" the preservation of what exists, the giving to it of continuance (of existence) and the governance of it at all times. Otherwise, how could the universe exist, if a higher hand did not govern and order everything visible and the human race?
*
Viewing the marvel of what happens every day in what we have become accustomed to call "nature" - the development, for example, of a fully mature plant, animal, or even human being from a tiny seed - we cannot help but see the continuous creative activity of God. But this is not all the same as the Creation of the Six Days, the original bringing into being of everything there is. The first chapter of Genesis describes this unique and unrepeatable creation.

Being accustomed to the "working" of God in our present world, we can scarcely conceive of that other kind of "work" which He did in the Six Days. The world, then, while perfect and fully formed, was still "new." St. Gregory the Theologian emphasizes that when God wished to create Adam of the dust, "the Word, having taken a part of the newly created earth, with His immortal hands formed my image." St. Ephraim the Syrian teaches:

*Just as the trees, the grasses, the animals, birds and man were at the same time both old and young: old in the appearance of their members and structures, young in the time of their creation; so also the moon was at the same time both old and young: young because it was just created, old because it was full as on the fifteenth day.
*
St. Ephraim and other Fathers emphasize this newness by stating their belief that the world was created in the spring. St. Ambrose ties his together with the fact that among the Hebrews the year began in the spring:

*He created heaven and earth at the time when the months began, from which time it is fitting that the world took its rise. Then there was the mild temperature of spring, a season suitable for all things. Consequently, the year, too, has the stamp of a world coming to birth.... In order to show that the creation of the world took place in the spring, Scripture says: "This month shall be to you the beginning of months, it is for you the first in the months of the year" (Ex. 12:2), calling the first month the springtime. It was fitting that the beginning of the year be the beginning of generation.
*
Now, after this look at the Holy Fathers' very realistic understanding of the Six Days of Creation, let us turn to the more complex question of the making of the crown of God's creation, man.

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## erowe1

> Every animal specifically mentioned in the bible were those alive during the time of the Bronze Age.


You mean the Bible doesn't specifically mention animals that the writers of the Bible didn't have words for? Imagine that.

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## otherone

> You mean the Bible doesn't specifically mention animals that the writers of the Bible didn't have words for? Imagine that.


????
_Genesis 2.20:
And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.

_

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## erowe1

> ????
> _Genesis 2.20:
> And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
> 
> _


What are you getting at? That Genesis should have included a catalog of the names he gave them?

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## ClydeCoulter

> What are you getting at? That Genesis should have included a catalog of the names he gave them?


No, it was in regards to your post that he responded to.

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## otherone

> What are you getting at? That Genesis should have included a catalog of the names he gave them?


You stated the writers of the bible didn't have words for all the animals....yet Adam named every one of them.

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## erowe1

> No, it was in regards to your post that he responded to.


But it doesn't make sense.

Regardless what Adam did, why would any of the biblical writers know about all those animals?

If Adam named the platypus, is that supposed to mean that we would expect Isaiah in 8th century BC Israel to know what a platypus was, much less mention one? And even if he did, how would we even know what he was talking about?

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## erowe1

> You stated the writers of the bible didn't have words for all the animals....yet Adam named every one of them.


So? Adam wasn't a biblical writer.

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## Theocrat

Here is a wonderful explanation of why the Genesis creation must be six literal days:

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## willwash

So if this is true, then the earth is only 10,000 years old or so.  How do you explain:

1)  The Appalachian mountains versus the Rockies.  You can see it intuitively and geological evidence supports the notion that

a) in many millions of years the Rockies will look like the Appalachians do now
b) many millions of years ago the Appalachians looked like the Rockies do now

This can't be true if the Appalachians and the Rockies were both created 10,000 years ago.


2)  The existence of coal and oil...fossil fuels...they take millions of years to form from the chemical energy in dead animals and plants


3) (and this one really gets me)  How can we look into a telescope and see stars that are farther than 10,000 light years away?  The fact that we can see light from these stars at distances of millions and billions of light years requires that they existed millions and billions of years ago.

4) The Grand Canyon

5) Measurable rates of continental drift plus the shape of their coastlines allow you to
a) discern that Africa and SOuth America were once joined, and
b) that they split apart many millions of years ago


Honestly, I could go on and on and on with visible, measurable and quantifiable evidence of an old earth/universe.  These are just a few examples off the top of my head.

To suggest a young earth based on scriptures is the greatest perversion of Occam's Razor I think I have ever seen

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## erowe1

> So if this is true, then the earth is only 10,000 years old or so.  How do you explain:
> 
> 1)  The Appalachian mountains versus the Rockies.  You can see it intuitively and geological evidence supports the notion that
> 
> a) in many millions of years the Rockies will look like the Appalachians do now
> b) many millions of years ago the Appalachians looked like the Rockies do now
> 
> This can't be true if the Appalachians and the Rockies were both created 10,000 years ago.


How do you go about finding out what the Appalachians and Rockies looked like when God created them?

Variations of the same question apply to all of your points.

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## matt0611

> How do you go about finding out what the Appalachians and Rockies looked like when God created them?
> 
> Variations of the same question apply to all of your points.


True, I think their were mountains there already when God created the Earth.

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## Sola_Fide

> Awww, how flattering.


So...what is your opinion on the 4 views and the conclusion in the article?

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## ClydeCoulter

> How do you go about finding out what the Appalachians and Rockies looked like when God created them?
> 
> Variations of the same question apply to all of your points.


What is your explanation for #3?

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## erowe1

> What is your explanation for #3?


I'm not offering an explanation for any of them. But the same question I asked applies to all of them.

What was the state of the universe when God created it? All of those criticisms assume that you can extrapolate physical change backwards ad infinitum. They're only as valid as that assumption is. And since that assumption is unfounded, so are those criticisms.

I also think that the relativity of time is relevant to the discussion, but we don't even need to get to that point. What I said above is enough.

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## ClydeCoulter

Wasn't the topic about the days of creation?  Are we (in the broader sense) leaving it at, who knows?

Perhaps some want to try to understand why the detail about the order and "morning and evening" of days, etc... 

But, I've read some (a great deal) of Enoch (or what is claimed to be Enoch), and it also contains lots of details which appear difficult to explain why so much detail if not to understand.

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## erowe1

> Wasn't the topic about the days of creation?  Are we (in the broader sense) leaving it at, who knows?


Yes, I'm talking about the criticisms posed above to the young-earth view.

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## erowe1

> But, I've read some (a great deal) of Enoch (or what is claimed to be Enoch), and it also contains lots of details which appear difficult to explain why so much detail if not to understand.


In the case of Enochic literature, it was meant to be understood by insiders but not outsiders. It's deliberately cryptic.

This is from 4 Ezra 14:



> And when the forty days were ended, the Most High spoke to me, saying, "Make public the twenty-four(1 books that you wrote first, and let the worthy and the unworthy read them; 46 but keep the seventy that were written last, in order to give them to the wise among your people. 47 For in them is the spring of understanding, the fountain of wisdom, and the river of knowledge." 48 And I did so.


I'm pretty sure that the 24 books are essentially the books of the Hebrew Bible/Protestant Old Testament, and the 70 include the Enochic books and others like them.

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## ClydeCoulter

> True, I think their were mountains there already when God created the Earth.


You are talking about when it was void and without form?  Before the creation described?

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## erowe1

> You are talking about when it was void and without form?  Before the creation described?


I assume he's talking about the form God gave the earth when he created it over those 6 days. At the end of that week, he's suggesting there were mountain ranges of various sizes that, if you viewed them with uniformitarian presuppositions, would appear to have an old age.

That's what I was driving at too. Unless you know what the mountains looked like when God made them, you can't extrapolate back from today to figure out how old they are.

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## ClydeCoulter

> In the case of Enochic literature, it was meant to be understood by insiders but not outsiders. It's deliberately cryptic.
> 
> This is from 4 Ezra 14:
> 
> 
> I'm pretty sure that the 24 books are essentially the books of the Hebrew Bible/Protestant Old Testament, and the 70 include the Enochic books and others like them.


So, who are the insiders that are allowed to see and/or understand the others?  Are there any of them on this earth at this time? (although I disagree with the premise of the 24 being the old testament or Hebrew bible, I'll leave at that for the time being).

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## erowe1

> So, who are the insiders that are allowed to see and/or understand the others?  Are there any of them on this earth at this time? (although I disagree with the premise of the 24 being the old testament or Hebrew bible, I'll leave at that for the time being).


There probably are people on the earth who consider themselves among those insiders. There are Christian denominations that consider 4 Ezra canonical, as well as some Enochic literature (Coptic and Ethiopic Christians in particular, but I don't remember exactly which books each revere). I assume they think those words apply to them.

At the time 4 Ezra was written, in the first century AD, it was for a sect of Judeans similar to those who had the Dead Sea Scrolls. For lack of a better term, you could call them "Enochic Jews," as some scholars do. That branch of Judean religion died off, unless you want to say that it survived in forms of Christianity that still use some of that literature.

Whatever the 24 books were, from the wording of that passage in 4 Ezra, they were obviously widely recognized books among Judeans of that time, while the 70 were not, but rather belonged to this sect as something they thought set them apart. It's hard for me to see how any list of 24 books like that would not be essentially the same as the 22 books of Josephus's Bible, which is the same corpus that predominates the quotations of the earliest Christian and rabbinic literature, which was clearly also a core set of texts for the Dead Sea Scrolls Community (to which, like 4 Ezra they added many others), which would also be the same as what is still today the Hebrew Bible, and also is essentially the same as the earliest lists we have of the Christian "Old Testament."

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## ClydeCoulter

So, you think Jude (or whoever wrote Jude) was among those that you describe in the first century?

_you say 4 Ezra 14, I find 2 Ezra 14:45, but I know there are more than one "booking"_

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## erowe1

> So, you think Jude (or whoever wrote Jude) was among those that you describe in the first century?


At the end of the day, I would argue that he wasn't. But because of the citations in the book, there's definitely a debate to be had about that. He may well have had some connection to them or others who were similar to them, or who also used some of the same books. And I wouldn't say the forms of Judaism of that day neatly fit into just a few "sects."

I definitely don't think the group that 4 Ezra was first written for was the only one that used some of those books. I don't think they were the same as the Dead Sea Scrolls community, for example, but had some similarities. Some of these Enochic works go back to 200 BC or before. So there was a long time for different groups to evolve in different directions using those books.

The Epistle of Barnabas is a second-century Christian writing that, much more clearly than Jude, definitely does come from a setting in which Enochic books were revered as holy scripture.

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## James Madison

> So...what is your opinion on the 4 views and the conclusion in the article?


What made you think I cared about your article?

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## ClydeCoulter

> At the end of the day, I would argue that he wasn't. But because of the citations in the book, there's definitely a debate to be had about that. He may well have had some connection to them or others who were similar to them, or who also used some of the same books. And I wouldn't say the forms of Judaism of that day neatly fit into just a few "sects."
> 
> I definitely don't think the group that 4 Ezra was first written for was the only one that used some of those books. I don't think they were the same as the Dead Sea Scrolls community, for example, but had some similarities. Some of these Enochic works go back to 200 BC or before. So there was a long time for different groups to evolve in different directions using those books.
> 
> The Epistle of Barnabas is a second-century Christian writing that, much more clearly than Jude, definitely does come from a setting in which Enochic books were revered as holy scripture.


I have read quite a bit of the "not so mainstream" writings, such as Maccabees, Enoch, Ezra, and the Gnostic writings.  I found quite a bit of crossover in various sects throughout the region and time. I found it interesting how the "official" set were gathered and decided on, for both the new and later old testament.  It has been quite a few years since I've thought much about any of it.  Well, actually until recently on the forums here.

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## erowe1

> I have read quite a bit of the "not so mainstream" writings, such as Maccabees, Enoch, Ezra, and the Gnostic writings.  I found quite a bit of crossover in various sects throughout the region and time. I found it interesting how the "official" set were gathered and decided on, for both the new and later old testament.  It has been quite a few years since I've thought much about any of it.  Well, actually until recently on the forums here.


Maccabees is pretty mainstream, even if it's not part of the Bible.

I probably don't accept what you mean by some official set being gathered and decided on.

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## ClydeCoulter

What is your opinion on taking writings that are written in an assumed name and time as a serious writing?

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## ClydeCoulter

> Maccabees is pretty mainstream, even if it's not part of the Bible.
> 
> I probably don't accept what you mean by some official set being gathered and decided on.


I'm referring to the set of books included in the mainstream bible(s) (various translations, of which Maccabees is not part of)

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## erowe1

> I'm referring to the set of books included in the mainstream bible(s) (various translations, of which Maccabees is not part of)


Protestants and Jews don't accept Maccabees as Scripture. But Catholics and Orthodox do.

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## ClydeCoulter

> Protestants and Jews don't accept Maccabees as Scripture. But Catholics and Orthodox do.


What did you mean by 



> I probably don't accept what you mean by some official set being gathered and decided on.

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## erowe1

> What did you mean by


I don't think that the canon of the Bible is the result of some decision made by some group somewhere.

The bulk of the Old Testament is clearly the scriptures that Jesus and his disciples considered scriptures in his own day, and had been considered scripture for centuries going back to when each book was written. The bulk of the New Testament is clearly the earliest literature that exists representing the Christianity of the apostles, and was revered by Christians as inspired Scripture from the moment it was written. There are no other books that we still have that are not in the New Testament and that have this same pedigree.

Some of the books in both testaments may be more marginal in terms of how important they were in Judaism and Christianity. But these make up a pretty small portion of the whole.

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## Sola_Fide

> Here is a wonderful explanation of why the Genesis creation must be six literal days:


I met Ken Ham a few years ago.  He is a fascinating person.  He's one of those guys where you wonder how his brain can contain all the knowledge that he has.

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## ClydeCoulter

> I don't think that the canon of the Bible is the result of some decision made by some group somewhere.
> 
> The bulk of the Old Testament is clearly the scriptures that Jesus and his disciples considered scriptures in his own day, and had been considered scripture for centuries going back to when each book was written. The bulk of the New Testament is clearly the earliest literature that exists representing the Christianity of the apostles, and was revered by Christians as inspired Scripture from the moment it was written. There are no other books that we still have that are not in the New Testament and that have this same pedigree.
> 
> Some of the books in both testaments may be more marginal in terms of how important they were in Judaism and Christianity. But these make up a pretty small portion of the whole.


How and when did the books get included into a "testament" set and:




> What is your opinion on taking writings that are written in an assumed name and time as a serious writing?

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## erowe1

> How and when did the books get included into a "testament" set and:


As soon as the earliest book of the New Testament was written, the previous books were the Old Testament and it was the New. As other inspired New Testament books were written, the corpus grew. The earliest Christian we know of to call the older books the Old Testament was Melito of Sardis in the mid-second century. But there was nothing novel about that except the name. The earliest Christian books we have outside the New Testament already quote books of the New Testament as Scripture. And a couple times one book that's in the New Testament quotes an older one as Scripture.





> What is your opinion on taking writings that are written in an assumed name and time as a serious writing?


That was a method that people used who wanted to create bona fides for their group as an alternative to apostolic Christianity, or as an alternative to mainstream Judaism. The practice (among Christian offshoots) wouldn't have existed if it weren't already the case that Christians had authoritative books they had received from the apostles.

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## Sola_Fide

Bump for FF.  The only exegetically sound way to interpret the days of creation is literal 24 hour days.




> The Days of Creation
> 
> 
> 
> In the beginning, God created the entire universe, out of no pre-existent material (ex nihilo), in a period of six days. And as A. A. Hodge pointed out, at the time of the writing of the Confession “modern science” had not yet challenged the solar day view of creation. Hence, there is little question that when the divines spoke of six creation days they had in mind twenty-four hour days. Hodge is correct. But long before “modern science” challenged Bible believers, there were Christian scholars (for example, Augustine), who have not held to a solar day view. Yet the divergence from a twenty-four hour day theory of creation did not seriously begin until the late 18th and early 19th centuries with the onslaught of evolutionary thinking. Sadly, the church has played the role of the sycophant; she has been all too quick to adapt to the teachings of modern scientists.
> 
> All too frequently orthodox Christians are heard to parrot the well-worn clichÈ “the Bible is not a textbook on science.” As John Robbins maintains, if what is meant by this statement is that the Bible is not exclusively about or especially for the study of science, then it is correct. But this is all too obvious, and it is not the normal meaning of this clichÈ. Usually when we hear “the Bible is not a textbook” what is meant is that we must study the Bible and then we must study science, and then we must compare notes to see what we are to believe.2 This form of thinking is well described by John Whitcomb:
> 
> Whenever there is an apparent conflict between the conclusions of the scientist and the conclusions of the theologian . . . the theologian must rethink his interpretation of the Scriptures . . . in such a way as to bring it into harmony with the general consensus of scientific opinion on these matters, since the Bible is not a textbook on science.
> ...


- See more at: http://www.trinityfoundation.org/jou....JZgTmkPK.dpuf

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## Christian Liberty

> I met Ken Ham a few years ago.  He is a fascinating person.  He's one of those guys where you wonder how his brain can contain all the knowledge that he has.


Just out of curiosity, what does Ken Ham believe about the atonement?




> Bump for FF.  The only exegetically sound way to interpret the days of creation is literal 24 hour days.
> 
> 
> - See more at: http://www.trinityfoundation.org/jou....JZgTmkPK.dpuf


I object strongly to this:




> Finally, it should be noted that the matter of the days of creation is not a minor issue. It is not just a subject of controversy between academicians. *It’s a matter of whether we are going to believe God as he has revealed himself to us in his Word, or whether we are going to believe the latest findings of modern science.* Douglas Kelly summarizes:


Now, it may be that some who wonder about the six day view are just believing science, but there is no reason this must be the case.  It certainly isn't for me.  I don't trust scientists much.  I've evangelized to students who do, and I usually tell them not to worry much about how long creation took because that isn't the point, and it isn't the gospel.

I am not prepared to say the traditional six day view is false.  I was brought up with it.  I've heard all the YEC arguments.  I honestly don't know how accurate they are.  I'm not really a scientific type.  But, my issues aren't really science.

I guess a big part of the issue is that a lot of Old earthers portray a low view of scripture when they say things like "The Bible isn't a science textbook."  I agree with trinity foundation that this is a horrible way to look at scripture.  But you don't HAVE to have this low of a view of scripture in order to believe that the six days are representative of longer periods of time.  Similar to how amillennialists are not necessarily denying the accuracy of scripture when they say Revelation 20 is not talking about a literal thousand years, or every sane Christian who rejects that the "beast" of Revelation 13 is a literal beast is somehow denying the accuracy of scripture.  I suppose some people who believe these things would say "Revelation isn't inerrant" but that's not a necessary component of such a view.

My questions come primarily from two Biblical texts.

First of all, Genesis 1:14-19, which, in short, talks about signs for days, seasons, and years being created.  Now, I understand that God could keep track of days even before men could.  But this scripture makes me wonder if the real point of Genesis 1 is to portray 24 hour days.  The creation of the "day" as a marker of time on day 4 makes me wonder about this.

Second of all, Genesis 2:5-9 features man being created before plants, which is a different order than Genesis 1.  One of these accounts must not be chronological.  I don't know which one.  This is not to say that either account is not really inspired or true, just that one of them is ordered by something other than chronology.

Ultimately, I don't know.  I'm not sure if "death entered the world through sin" is talking about animals or solely about humans.  I certainly think a big part of it is referring to spiritual death.  If animals died before the Fall, that wouldn't really shake my faith in the Bible.

Your link mentions "ape-men" being among the things that may have existed in a gap between Genesis 1:1-2.  I should clarify now that I do not believe humans evolved.  This is my biggest issue with evolution, animals evolving is a less significant problem for me, but there's no way I can personally reconcile humans evolving from animals with the Bible.  Humanity is clearly a special creation, and while I don't think this is a salvation/gospel issue, I do believe its a serious error and heterodox position to claim that humans evolved.  The idea of humans evolving is a separate question  from how old the earth is.  

I want to read more about the revelatory day theory, but my dad mentioned that it seemed to be refuted in his mind by the fact that Exodus clarifies that God created in six days, rather than revealing creation to Moses in six days.  For awhile I wondered if this theory might be true, but I think my dad's argument is sound.  I'd like to see a response from someone who actually believes in this theory, but I'd tend to  reject it  based on my dad's argument.

I tend to believe that animals did not evolve, and would take the fact that animals were created "according to their kinds" and would tend to think that this disproves the idea of animals evolving.  However, I am not certain.

Beyond this, I don't really know for sure.  I'm curious to know more, but I dislike the name-calling from both sides.  Young earthers are not necessarily denying scientific fact, while Old earthers are not necessarily denying the Bible's authority.

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## Sola_Fide

> I don't think that the canon of the Bible is the result of some decision made by some group somewhere.
> 
> The bulk of the Old Testament is clearly the scriptures that Jesus and his disciples considered scriptures in his own day, and had been considered scripture for centuries going back to when each book was written. The bulk of the New Testament is clearly the earliest literature that exists representing the Christianity of the apostles, and was revered by Christians as inspired Scripture from the moment it was written. There are no other books that we still have that are not in the New Testament and that have this same pedigree.
> 
> Some of the books in both testaments may be more marginal in terms of how important they were in Judaism and Christianity. But these make up a pretty small portion of the whole.


I agree.

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