Young Earth creationism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Part of the series on

Creationism

History of creationism Neo-Creationism

Christian views

Day-age creationism Gap Creationism Old Earth creationism Progressive creationism Theistic evolution Young Earth creationism

Non-Christian views

Hindu · Islamic · Jewish

Creation Theology

Creation in Genesis Genesis as an allegory Framework interpretation Omphalos hypothesis

Creation science

Baraminology Flood geology Intelligent design

Controversy

Politics of creationism Public education History Teach the Controversy Associated articles This box: view • talk • edit

Young Earth creationism is a religious doctrine which teaches that the Earth and life on Earth were created by a direct action of God relatively recently (about 6,000 years ago). It is held by those Christians who believe that the Hebrew text of Genesis can only mean a literal six (24-Hour) day account of creation, that evidence for a strictly factual interpretation of the text is present in the world today, and that scientific evidence does not support Darwinian evolution or geological uniformitarianism.

Many of its adherents are active in the development of Creation Science, a creationist endeavor that holds that the events associated with supernatural creation can be evidenced and modeled through an interpretation of the scientific method. There is no support for a "young Earth" theory in professional science journals or among professional science organizations,^[1][2] which Young Earth Creationists claim is often due to discrimination and censorship. [1][2] [3] [4]

Contents 1 History 1.1 Origins 1.2 Decline 1.3 Revival 2 Characteristics and beliefs 2.1 Age of the Earth 2.2 Attitude towards mainstream science 2.3 View of the Bible 2.4 Interpretation of Genesis 2.5 Human history 2.6 Animal behaviour 2.7 Diversification of life 2.8 Paleontology and dinosaurs 3 Comparison with other forms of creationism 3.1 Old Earth creationism 3.2 Gap creationism 3.3 The Omphalos hypothesis 4 Criticism 4.1 Scientific 4.2 Theological 5 References 6 See also 7 External links 7.1 Young Earth videos 7.2 Websites critical of YEC 7.3 Websites supportive of YEC 7.4 Articles

[edit] History

[edit] Origins

Some young earth creationists have claimed that this view has its earliest roots in Judaism, citing for example, the commentary on Genesis by Ibn Ezra (c. 1089–1164).^[3] However, Shai Cherry of Vanderbilt University notes that Jewish theologians have generally rejected such literalist interpretations of the written text, and that even Jewish commentators who oppose some aspects of Darwinian thought generally accept scientific evidence that the Earth is much older.^[4] Although the Reformation hermeneutic inclined some of the Reformers and later Protestants toward an ordinary day, younger-earth view, the majority of the early Church Fathers including Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Origen, Augustine, Eusebius, and Basil did not believe the Genesis account depicted ordinary solar days.

For much of the history of Christianity, the majority viewpoint in the absence of scientific evidence to contradict it was that the universe was made by a rational Creator; this viewpoint was held by many of the founders of modern science, such as Copernicus, Kepler, Faraday, Galileo, Maxwell, Newton, Boyle, Pascal and Nicolas Steno. However, the development of scientific methods of enquiry, and the discovery that geological strata and fossil sequences provided no evidence for a universal deluge soon produced a decline in the scientific belief in Young Earth Creationism.

[edit] Decline

Support for Young Earth creationism declined from the 18th century onwards with the development of the scientific revolution, and scientific paradigm shifts. James Hutton, now regarded as the father of modern geology, opened up the concept of deep time for scientific inquiry. Rather than accepting that the Earth was no more than a few thousand years old, he maintained that the Earth must be much older (indeed, he asserted that the Earth was infinitely old). Hutton stated that:

the past history of our globe must be explained by what can be seen to be happening now … No powers are to be employed that are not natural to the globe, no action to be admitted except those of which we know the principle.

['Theory of the Earth', a paper (with the same title of his 1795 book) communicated to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and published in Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1785; cited with approval in Holmes, A., Principles of Physical Geology, 2nd edition, Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd., Great Britain, pp. 43–44, 1965.]

Hutton's main line of argument was that the tremendous displacements and changes he was seeing did not happen in a short period of time by means of catastrophe, but that the incremental processes of uplift and erosion happening on the Earth in the present day had caused them. As these processes were very gradual, the Earth needed to be ancient, in order to allow time for the changes to occur. Before long, scientific inquiries building upon his claims had pushed back the age of the Earth into the millions of years — still much younger than commonly accepted by modern scientists, but a great change from the literalist view of an Earth that was only a few thousand years old.

Hutton's ideas, called uniformitarianism, or Gradualism were popularized by Sir Charles Lyell in the early 19th century. The energetic advocacy of Lyell led to the public and scientific communities largely accepting an ancient Earth. This philosophy governed the interpretation of geological data by the Reverends William Buckland, Adam Sedgwick and other early geologists. By mid-century, mainstream science had abandoned Young Earth creationism as a serious hypothesis. Many religious groups also abandoned Young Earth creationism as a literal description of the Earth's history and came to regard the Biblical account of creation in Genesis as purely allegorical or mythological.

As of 1997, an estimated 95% of US citizens with degrees in science reject the idea of a young Earth. [5]. Among those scientists who work in fields related to geology, the percentage of those rejecting the idea of a young Earth is even higher.

[edit] Revival

The rise of fundamentalist Christianity at the start of the twentieth century saw a revival of interest in Young Earth creationism, as a part of their rejection of the explanation of evolution. In 1923, George McCready Price, a Seventh-day Adventist and amateur geologist, wrote The New Geology to provide an explicitly fundamentalist perspective on geology. The book was partly inspired by the book Patriarchs and Prophets in which Seventh-day Adventist prophetess Ellen G. White described the impact of the Great flood on the shape of the earth. Harry Rimmer was another prominent exponent of similar views, at least during some of his evangelizing career (Rimmer appears to have also subscribed to "gap creationism", and a local flood, at least at some times).

Price's work was adapted and updated by Henry M. Morris and John C. Whitcomb Jr. in their book The Genesis Flood in 1961. Morris and Whitcomb argued that the Earth was geologically recent and that the Great Flood had laid down most of the geological strata in the space of a single year, reviving pre-Uniformitarian arguments. Given this history, they argued, "the last refuge of the case for evolution immediately vanishes away, and the record of the rocks becomes a tremendous witness... to the holiness and justice and power of the living God of Creation!"

This became the foundation of a new generation of Young Earth creationist thinkers, who organized themselves around Morris' Institute for Creation Research. Sister organizations such as the Creation Research Society have sought to re-interpret geological formations within a Young Earth creationist viewpoint. Langdon Gilkey writes,

... no distinction is made between scientific theories on the one hand and philosophical or religious theories on the other, between scientific questions and the sorts of questions religious beliefs seek to answer... It is, therefore, no surprise that in their theological works, as opposed to their creation science writings, creationists regard evolution and all other theories associated with it, as the intellectual source for and intellectual justification of everything that is to them evil and destructive in modern society. For them all that is spiritually healthy and creative has been for a century or more under attack by "that most complex of godless movements spawned by the pervasive and powerful system of evolutionary uniformitarianism", "If the system of flood geology can be established on a sound scientific basis... then the entire evolutionary cosmology, at least in its present neo-Darwinian form, will collapse. This in turn would mean that every anti-Christian system and movement (communism, racism, humanism, libertarianism, behaviorism, and all the rest) would be deprived of their pseudo-intellectual foundation", "It [evolution] has served effectively as the pseudo-scientific basis of atheism, agnosticism, socialism, fascism, and numerous faulty and dangerous philosophies over the past century"

(Gilkey, 1998, p. 35; quotations from Henry Morris).

Morris' ideas had a considerable impact on creationism and fundamentalist Christianity. Armed with the backing of conservative organizations and individuals, his brand of "creation science" was widely promoted throughout the United States and overseas, with his books being translated into at least ten different languages.

In 1978, the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy developed the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy which included the following:

WE DENY that Biblical infallibility and inerrancy are limited to spiritual, religious, or redemptive themes, exclusive of assertions in the fields of history and science. We further deny that scientific hypotheses about earth history may properly be used to overturn the teaching of Scripture on creation and the flood. [6]

The revival of Young Earth creationism has had no significant impact on modern science — creation science is regarded as pseudoscience by mainstream scientists. However, it has had a significant impact on science education, almost exclusively in the United States, where periodic controversies have raged over the appropriateness of teaching Young Earth creationist doctrine and creation science in public schools (see Teach the Controversy).

Young Earth creationism has also failed to make much of an impact outside of fundamentalist Protestant denominations. Virtually all other Christian denominations, including the Roman Catholic Church, reject the concept of Young Earth creationism. Many Bible scholars reject the fundamentalist approach to taking Genesis literally. Young Earth creationists disagree.

[edit] Characteristics and beliefs

[edit] Age of the Earth

The defining characteristic of this belief is that the Earth is "young", on the order of 6,000 to 10,000 years old, rather than the age of 4.5 billion years estimated by a variety of scientific methods including radiometric dating. YECs typically derive their range of figures using the ages given in the genealogies and other dates in the Bible, similar to the process used by James Ussher (1581–1656), Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, when he dated creation at 4004 BC. Ussher's chronology, published in 1650, has been subsequently revised many times, most recently in 2003 by Larry and Marion Pierce.

YECs believe that life was created by God 'each after their kind' in the universe's first six normal-length (24-hour) days. Additionally, they believe that the Biblical account of Noah's flood is historically true, maintaining that there was a worldwide flood (circa 2349 BC) that destroyed all terrestrial life except that which was saved on Noah's Ark. (Barry Setterfield proposed in 1999 that the flood occurred much earlier around 3536 BC.) This global flood is thought to be responsible for the multitude of geological features that mainstream science regards as evidence for an old earth.

[edit] Attitude towards mainstream science

Young Earth creationism is normally characterized as opposing evolution, though it also opposes many claims and theories in the fields of geology, astronomy, cosmology, molecular biology, genomics, linguistics, anthropology, archeology and any other fields of science that have developed theories or made claims incompatible with the Young Earth version of world history. YECs are fundamentally opposed to any explanation for the origins of anything which replaces God as the universal creator as reported in the Bible, whether it be the origins of biological diversity, the origins of life or the origins of the universe itself. This has led some YECs to criticize intelligent design, a proposal which some see as an alternative form of creationism, for not taking a stand on the age of the Earth, special creation, or even the identity of the designer. Some YECs see this as too compromising[7].

Young Earth creationists challenge philosophical naturalism and uniformitarianism as the dominant principles of the mainstream scientific community, and assert instead that the physical evidence today best supports original catastrophism and the Young Earth creationist viewpoint. See Creation-evolution controversy for a more complete discussion.

[edit] View of the Bible

Young Earth creationists regard the Bible as both a mandatory moral guide and a historically accurate, factually inerrant record of natural history. They accept its authority as the central organizing text for human life -- the sole indisputable source of knowledge on every topic, from the physical workings of the universe to the purpose of a man's existence. As Henry Morris, a leading Young Earth creationist, explained it, Christians who flirt with less-than-literal readings of biblical texts are also flirting with theological disaster^{[citation needed]}. For the vast majority of Young Earth creationists, an allegorical reading of the Genesis accounts of Creation, the Fall, the Deluge, and the Tower of Babel would undermine core Christian doctrines like the birth and resurrection of Jesus Christ. According to Morris, Christians must "either ... believe God's Word all the way, or not at all."^{[citation needed]} Therefore, YECs take the account of Genesis to be a historical account of the origin of the Earth and life. The corollary is that many YECs regard Christians who do not regard Genesis as historically accurate as being inconsistent.

[edit] Interpretation of Genesis

Young Earth Creationists interpret the text of Genesis in a strictly literal fashion. Therefore, they believe that God created the world in six normal-length days, and planted the Garden of Eden for the habitation of an original human couple (Adam and Eve). As a result of the subsequent Fall of Man, humanity was forced to work hard to provide food, childbirth became painful, and physical death entered the world. Some YECs assert that prior to the Fall all animals were herbivores (see below).

The Genealogies of Genesis record the line of descent from Adam through Noah to Abraham. YECs usually interpret these genealogies literally, including the extreme ages of the men (over 900 years in some cases). Differences of opinion exist regarding whether the genealogies should be taken as complete or abbreviated, hence the 6000 - 10,000 year range usually quoted for the Earth's age.

YECs believe that the great flood described in Genesis 6-9 was global in extent, and submerged the highest mountains on Earth. A range of suggestions are made to account for the mechanism for such a deluge. Earlier generations (following the lead of Morris and Whitcomb) believed that an orbiting vapor canopy collapsed, generating extreme rainfall (from "windows of heaven"). In more recent times it has been proposed that radical geological activity (the opening of the "fountains of the great deep") was largely responsible for the flood—elaborate theories such as Catastrophic plate tectonics and hydroplates have been put forward by some. These theories have the added benefit of explaining how the flood transformed an originally flatter Earth, raising up mountains and dropping sea beds; this then solves the problem of finding sufficient water to cover Mount Everest. Whatever the case, almost all Young Earth Creationists refer to a loosely codified idea called "Flood geology" to argue that the vast majority of present-day geological features are the result of the Great Flood.

To support their belief in a worldwide flood, YECs argue that anthropological evidence supports their belief that every culture studied has, in its history, a myth or story similar to that of Noah in two aspects: 1) the occurrence of a catastrophic flood and 2) human and animal life saved by a man who built a large boat and took aboard it for the duration of the flood enough life to repopulate the earth. According to Genesis, two of every "unclean" kind of animal (male and female) and seven of every "clean" kind of animal were placed on the ark during the flood.

After the flood, Genesis reports increasingly shortened lifespans dropping quickly from an average of 900 years at the time of Noah to an average of 100 by the time of Abraham. Some Young Earth Creationists have suggested that this is due to effects associated with inbreeding that took place after the flood, as only eight people remained. [8] Another theory suggests that the Earth had a higher concentration of oxygen prior to the Flood, possibly due to a layer of water vapor ("vapor canopy") above the Earth. The result of such a postulation would be a giant Hyperbaric Chamber, extending lifespans. Yet others hypothesize that the "firmament" of the "waters above" screened the Earth from harmful ultraviolet rays, which they argue, shorten life expectancy.

[edit] Human history

In keeping with a strictly literal interpretation of Genesis, Young Earth creationists believe that Adam and Eve were the universal ancestors of the entire human race; accordingly it is usually held that their sons and daughters married amongst themselves to produce the next generation of children.[9] Noah's flood is supposed to have killed all humans on earth with the exception of Noah and his sons and their wives. All humans alive today are therefore believed to be descended from this single family, which carried the gene pool for the entire human race. In contradiction to what is accepted by mainstream anthropology, young earth creationists assert that native Americans, Australian aborigines and all other races arose from the migration of people around the world following the Tower of Babel event in the 3rd millennium BC.

Genealogies in the Genesis text identify individuals named Egypt, Gomer, Sheba, Canaan, and Sidon, who are said to have founded the cities and civilizations that were later to bear their names.

[edit] Animal behaviour

Many (but not all) young earth creationists interpret Genesis to teach that prior to the Fall of man there was no predatory or carnivorous activity amongst animals, and animals did not die. It is thought that all animals, together with humans, subsisted on an entirely vegetarian diet. This raises the question of what was the original (i.e. pre-Fall) function of such things as snake venom and spiders webs. YECs typically answer these questions either by postulating a non-lethal original purpose for these predatory mechanisms (eg. snake venom was designed to soften fruit), or suggesting that these mechanisms were miraculously added to animals by God or the devil at the time of the Fall.[10]

The implication of these ideas - that before the Fall animals would eventually exceed the carrying capacity of the earth - is not considered a problem by some YECs since they believe that the earth did not remain in its unfallen state for any (generationally) appreciable time.

[edit] Diversification of life

YECs also assert that all modern species of land vertebrates are descended from those original animals on the ark. Most YECs believe that the Ark "kinds" diversified as they subsequently adapted to their environments by the process of variation and rapid natural selection. The selection of such animals as kangaroo and koalas on the ark is based upon hypothesized sunken land bridges between Australia and South East Asia, over which Noah or his sons, or the ancestors of the animals themselves, could travel. Many YECs assert that the process of variation and natural selection resulted in a net loss of genetic information.

[edit] Paleontology and dinosaurs

Young Earth creationists do not deny the existence of dinosaurs and other extinct animals present in the fossil record. They assert, instead, that fossilized extinct creatures represent the remains of animals which perished in the Great Flood. They also assert that Noah took dinosaurs with him in his Ark, and that they became extinct at a later time, like other animals such as the dodo. The newly-established Creation Museum in Kentucky portrays humans and dinosaurs co-existing before the Flood — one exhibit even portrays a saddled triceratops [11]. For many years, YECs referred to supposed associated human and dinosaur tracks in the Paluxy Riverbed of Glen Rose, Texas as proof of coexistence, though most now have abandoned this man track controversy as careful scrutiny of the claims have shown them to be either fabrications or spurious phenomena. Some creationists assert that living dinosaurs (as well as other extinct creatures such as plesiosaurs) still survive in isolated spots, accounting for alleged sightings of lake or sea monsters.[12] Other creationists urge caution about alleged plesiosaurs living today, since rotting basking sharks can form a pseudo-plesiosaur shape.[13] Creationists sometimes turn to cryptozoology to support the idea that creatures known from fossils lived alongside humans in historical times.

[edit] Comparison with other forms of creationism

Young Earth creationism is only one of several forms of creationism. Young Earth creationists typically oppose these alternative theories, which they consider to be as "compromises" with science[14] or otherwise flawed.

[edit] Old Earth creationism

See also: Old Earth creationism

Young Earth creationists reject Old Earth creationism and Day-Age Creationism on textual and theological grounds. In addition, Young Earth creationists claim the scientific data in geology and astronomy point to a young earth, against the consensus of the general scientific community.

Young Earth creationists generally hold that when Genesis describes the creation of the Earth occurring over a period of days, this indicates normal-length 24 hour days, and cannot reasonably be interpreted otherwise. They agree that the Hebrew word for "day" (yôm) can refer to either a 24-hour day or a long or unspecified time, but argue that whenever the latter interpretation is used it includes a preposition defining the long or unspecified period. In the specific context of Genesis 1, since the days are both numbered and are referred to as "evening and morning", this can mean only normal-length days. Further, they argue that the 24-hour day is the only interpretation that makes sense of the Sabbath command in Exodus 20:8–11. YECs argue that it is a glaring exegetical fallacy to take a meaning from one context (yom referring to a long period of time in Genesis 1) and apply it to a completely different one (yom referring to normal-length days in Exodus 20). [15]

Further, Young Earth creationists argue that their position is the only way to explain the Fall, which introduced death and suffering into the world. They argue that all long-age views entail death before sin, which they regard as a severe theological error, violating Genesis 3, and for Christians, Romans 5:12–19, 8:17–22 and 1 Corinthians 15:21–22.[16]. Further discussion and refutation of these objections can be found on the Day-Age Creationism page.

[edit] Gap creationism

See also: Gap creationism

The "gap theory" acknowledges a vast age for the universe, including the Earth and solar system, while asserting that life was created recently in six 24-hour days by divine fiat. Genesis 1 is thus interpreted literally, with an indefinite "gap" of time inserted between the first two verses. (Some gap theorists insert a "primordial creation" and Lucifer's rebellion into the gap.)

Most Young Earth creationist organisations reject the gap theory in its various forms.^[5][6] It is asserted that the entire universe is only thousands of years old.

[edit] The Omphalos hypothesis

Many Young Earth Creationists distinguish their own hypotheses from the Omphalos hypothesis, today more commonly referred to as the apparent age concept, put forth by the science writer Philip Henry Gosse. Gosse's hypothesis was an unsuccessful mid-19th century attempt to reconcile creationism with geology. He proposed that just as Adam had a navel (omphalos is Greek for navel), evidence of a gestation he never experienced, so also the Earth was created ex nihilo complete with evidence of a prehistoric past that never actually occurred. Gosse's hypothesis allows for a young Earth without giving rise to any predictions that would contradict scientific findings of an old Earth. This was rejected at the time by scientists on the grounds that it was completely unfalsifiable and theologians because it implied a deceitful God, which was theologically unacceptable.

Most YECs today argue that Adam did not have a navel [17], and in contrast to Gosse, posit that not only is the Earth young but the scientific data supports that view. However, the apparent age concept is still used in young earth creationist literature[18][19][20].

[edit] Criticism

[edit] Scientific

Young Earth creationism was abandoned as a mainstream scientific concept more than 150 years ago. While many mainstream scientists accept it as a faith position, they contend that it is just that, and regard attempts to prove it scientifically as being little more than religiously motivated pseudoscience. In 1997, a poll by the Gallup organization showed that 5% of US scientists believed in creationism; however, not all creationists are YECs. Some subscribe to Old Earth creationism, which posits an act of creation that took place millions or billions of years ago.

Critics argue that every challenge to evolution by Young Earth creationists is either made in an unscientific fashion, or is readily explainable by mainstream science, and that while a gap in scientific knowledge may exist now it is likely to be closed through further research. While mainstream scientists acknowledge that there are indeed a number of gaps in the mainstream scientific theory, they generally reject the creationist viewpoint that these gaps represent insurmountable flaws with evolution. Those working in the field who pointed out the gaps in the first place have often explicitly rejected the creationist interpretation. The "God of the gaps" viewpoint has also been criticized by theologians, although creationists claim that their models are based on what is known, not on gaps in knowledge.

Christian Young Earth creationists adhere strongly to the concept of Biblical inerrancy, which declares the Bible to be divinely inspired and therefore scientifically infallible and non-correctable. This position is considered by devotees and critics alike to be incompatible with the principles of scientific objectivity. The creationist organizations Answers in Genesis (AiG) and Institute for Creation Research (ICR) require all members to pledge support for Biblical inerrancy.

Young Earth creationists often suggest that supporters of evolution theory are primarily motivated by atheism. Critics reject this claim by pointing out that many supporters of evolutionary theory are in fact religious believers, and that major religious groups such as the Roman Catholic Church and Church of England believe that the concept of biological evolution does not imply a rejection of the scriptures. Nor do they support the specific doctrines of biblical inerrancy proposed by Young Earth Creationism. Critics also like to point out how workers in fields related to evolutionary biology are not required to sign statements of (non-)belief comparable to the Biblical inerrancy pledges required by ICR and AiG (although many creationism believers insist that scientists operate on an a priori disbelief in Biblical principles.) [21]. Young Earth Creationists also discount Christian faith positions, like those of French Jesuit priest, geologist and paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin who saw that his work with evolutionary sciences actually confirmed and inspired his faith in the cosmic Christ. Nor do they believe the views of Fr. Thomas Berry, Catholic priest, cultural historian and eco-theologian, that the cosmological 13 billion year "Universe Story" provides all faiths and all traditions a single account by which the divine has made its presence in the world.

Proponents of YEC are regularly accused of quote mining, the dishonest practice of isolating passages from academic texts that appear to support their claims while deliberately excluding context and conclusions to the contrary [22]. The creationist side responds that they simply make legitimate use of "hostile witness" evidence when they dispute evolution theory with contradictory quotations from the evolutionists themselves. They also assert that critics routinely attack YEC positions with far more egregious misuse of passages from the Bible.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Theological

Some theologians oppose the proposition that God can be a legitimate or viable subject for scientific experimentation, and reject a literal interpretation of Genesis. They propose there are statements in the creation week itself which render the historical interpretation of Genesis incompatible with known science.

One example is that God created the Earth and heavens, and light, on Day 1, plant life on Day 3, and the sun and moon on Day 4. One must ask where the light in Day 1 came from, and why there were plants in Day 3 if the sun, which provides all light to the Earth, did not even exist until Day 4. Young Earth creationists such as Basil the Great and John Calvin long ago answered this by suggesting that the light created by God on Day 1 was the light source. Answers in Genesis has refined this by suggesting that the earth was already rotating with respect to this light. [23] One can also make a case that God created the plants toward the evening of Day 3, the Sun was created on the morning of Day 4, therefore the plants only had to endure darkness for a period not much longer than a typical night.

Another problem is the fact that distant galaxies can be seen. If the universe did not exist until 10,000 years ago, then light from anything farther than 10,000 light-years would not have time to reach us. Some creationists attempt to equate this with the horizon problem, however these problems are quite different. Most mainstream cosmologists accept an inflation model as the likely explanation for the horizon problem. Inflationary models also account for other phenomena, and are in agreement with observations of recent microwave anisotropy satellites. Creationists have also proposed models to explain why we see distant starlight. [24], [25] See creationist cosmologies for more information.

Many critics claim that Genesis itself is internally inconsistent on the question of whether man was created before the animals (Genesis 2:19) or after the animals as stated in Genesis 1. Proponents of the Documentary hypothesis suggest that Genesis 1 was a litany from the "Priestly" source (possibly from an early Jewish liturgy) while Genesis 2 was assembled from older "Jawhist" material, holding that for both stories to be a single account, Adam would have named all the animals, and God would have created Eve from his rib as a suitable mate, all within a single 24 hour period. Many creationists attribute this view to misunderstanding having arisen from poor translation of the tenses in Genesis 2 in contemporary translations of the Bible (e.g. compare "planted" and "had planted" in KJV and NIV).

Some Christians assert that the Bible is free from error only in religious and moral matters, and that where scientific questions are concerned, the Bible should not be read literally. This position is held by a number of major denominations. For instance, in a publication entitled The Gift of Scripture [26] (October 2005), the Catholic Church of England and Wales comments that "We should not expect to find in Scripture full scientific accuracy or complete historical precision". The Bible is held to be true in passages relating to human salvation, but "We should not expect total accuracy from the Bible in other, secular matters." However, that view of the inerrancy of scripture was rejected by Paul VI in the formulation of Dei Verbum 11 forcing the commission to adjust the wording and add crucial footnotes to keep it in line with prior teaching. The relater then said that it was not to be understood as limiting biblical inerrancy to only matters of salvation. However that view has since become predominant due to the deliberate decision to interpret it in a heterodox manner regardless of what it was truly asserting. [27] By contrast, Young Earth creationists contend that moral and spiritual matters in the Bible are intimately connected with its historical accuracy; in their view, the Bible stands or falls as a single indivisible block of knowledge. [28]

Theologians have also taken the stance, (early examples of this are Augustine of Hippo and Galileo) where the problem between "science" and the Bible is merely one of interpretation. Since the creator of the universe is held to be the creator of the Bible, these theologians hold that there should be no contradiction between the two; and if there is, it is only on the part of the interpreter. In this view, parts of the bible should be taken metaphorically, since they were never meant to be interpreted as literal in the first place. Science in this view would be a useful tool, as it would show the proper way to interpret scriptures that are unclear.

Aside from the theological objections voiced by other Christians, Young Earth creationism also stands in opposition to the creationist mythologies of other religions (both extant and extinct). Many of these make claims regarding the origin of the universe and humanity that are completely incompatible with those of Christian creationists (and with one another).

[edit] References

1. ^ "Scientists say that earth is billions of years old" "Parks Agency Leaves Controversial Book on Shelf" New York Times, January 5, 2007 http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/05/washington/05canyon.htm?_r=1&oref=slogin
2. ^ The Creation Research Society http://creationresearch.org
3. ^ James-Griffiths, Paul. Creation days and Orthodox Jewish tradition. Answers in Genesis.
4. ^ Cherry, Shai. "Crisis management via Bilbical Interpretation: Fundamentalism, Modern Orthodoxy, and Genesis." in Geoffrey Cantor and Marc Swetlitz (editors) Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism. University of Chicago Press (2006).
5. ^ Henry M. Morris (December 1987). The gap theory—an idea with holes?. Retrieved on February 14, 2007.
6. ^ Don Batten (June 2004). ‘Soft’ gap sophistry. Retrieved on February 14, 2007.

[edit] See also

• Young Earth Creationist cosmologies
• List of Young Earth Creationists
• Dating Creation
• Rapid-decay theory
• Ussher chronology
• Existence
• Timeline of the Universe
• Ultimate fate of the Universe
• Creator god
• Day-Age Creationism
• Gap Creationism
• Cosmogony
• Cosmological argument
• Biblical cosmology
• Deism
• Theism
• Starlight problem
• Living dinosaurs
• Quran
• Rationalism
• Elohim
• Higher criticism
• Ex nihilo
• Sons of Noah
• Antediluvian

[edit] External links

[edit] Young Earth videos

• Critical Review of Radioisotopes & the Age of the Earth - a Young Earth video
• The Evolution of a Creationist 4 part DVD - Four 15 minute clips from Dr. Jobe Martin's new DVD series

[edit] Websites critical of YEC

• Answers In Creation - Old earth creationist website purportedly demonstrating the errors of young earth creationism
• [29]Open forum debate of YEC vs OEC: latest info 2007

[edit] Websites supportive of YEC

• Answers in Genesis
• Creation Ministries International
• Institute for Creation Research
• CreationWiki.org

[edit] Articles

• Bradshaw, Robert I., "The Early Church & the Age of the Earth"
• Grigg, R., 1993. Should Genesis be taken literally?, Creation 16(1):38–41 (principles of biblical interpretation, hermeneutics)
• Steinmann, A., 2002. אחד (Echad) as an Ordinal Number and the Meaning of Genesis 1:5 (PDF), Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society (JETS) 45(4):577–584 (argues that the numbering and definite article patterns of Genesis 1 indicate 24-hour days)
• Hasel, G.F., 1994. The ‘days’ of creation in Genesis 1: Literal ‘days’ or figurative ‘periods/epochs’ of time?, Origins 21(1):5–38 (defends literal days).
• McCabe, R.V., 2000. A Defense of Literal Days in the Creation Week (PDF), Detroit Baptist Seminary Journal 5:97–123, 2000
• Stambaugh, 1991. Days of Creation: A semantic approach TJ 5(1):70–78 (analyses the meaning of Hebrew yôm ("day") in different context and long-age words, concludes that creation days were 24 hours)
• Sarfati, J., 2003. Biblical chronogenealogies, TJ 17(3):14–18 (defends Masoretic chronology of Gen. 5 & 11, and rejects gaps)
• Grigg, R., 2003. Meeting the ancestors, Creation 25(2):13–15 (on the genealogies and lifespans)
• Grigg, R., 1997. From the beginning of Creation: Does Genesis have a gap?, Creation 19(2):35–38 (why YECs reject the gap theory)
• Batten, D., 1996. Some questions for theistic evolutionists (and 'progressive creationists'), from AiG, Creation 18(3):37
• Grigg, R., 2001. Do I have to believe in a literal creation to be a Christian?, Creation 23(3):20–22 (AiG answers "No, but …")
• US poll results — Public beliefs about evolution and creation
• Lane Coffee and Darrick Dean, "Introduction to the Creation-Date Debate"; long-age perspective
• Evowiki article on the History of Young Earth Creationism