03-23-2008, 09:22 AM
Hi Thirdwoe:
If I was certain of your name, I'd address you as such. The book of Genesis is a pain in the neck for virtually all higher learning institutions in this generation, in the aftermath of Darwin's book "On The Origin of the Species". The question, Young Earth or Old Earth? would not arise if it was not for Darwin and the athiestic generation that coddled his point of view.
Genesis 1:20 begins the Fifth Day when God created living creatures in the sea, and birds in the sky. The phrase "nefesh khayia" is used to describe them. The fifth day ends in Genesis 1:23. Remember "nefesh khayia". Genesis 1:24 begins the sixth day, and again the phrase "nefesh khayia" is used, but this time to describe land animals. This phrase also appears in Genesis 2:7 to describe the formation of androgenous Adam along with the phrase "nishmat khayim". The phrase "nishmat ruakh khayim" appears in Genesis 7:22 when all humanity is destroyed in the flood. That's the basic framework used in Genesis. Call it a time framework if you will. Day as we know it is set by the revolution of the earth. Evening and morning is the result of a 24 hour period clocking the earth's revolution in space. We can speculate that the rotation of the earth was slower on the first day, but why would that be necessary? According to the text, no "nefesh khayia" were created till the fifth day and man, created on the sixth day is the only intelligent observer. It appears to me that it is a matter of faith to believe that the revolution of the earth was already fixed on the first day. I suggest that this is the point made in Hebrews 11:3. Now, evolutionists seem to need long, long periods of time to support the "short, but sure changes of evolution", as Darwin phrased it. Nevertheless, in our modern time it is the athiests that embrace his teachings, rejecting faith, not because there is something to be gained scientifically by speculating long days or changing periods of rotation of the earth, but because the Genesis record also contains the history of the sinful fall of humanity, shortly after his creation. If the evolutionist can somehow destroy the credibility of the Genesis record, he can also wipe out the very record that points to his sinfulness, as a descendent of Adam.
Every evolutionist is a descendent of Adam, namely living soul, "nefesh khayia" with the Breath of Life from God, "living nashama"(Genesis 2:7). It is this living spiritual nashama that gives humanity the ability to articulate and communicate with God. Sin is the very act that has severed our relationship with God. Darwinian theory and all that it claims cannot bring healing to the severed relationship between God and humanity.
Our learning institutions are dominated by athiests that have turned their backs on the Living God and cannot respond to His Spirit, as their Creator. Therefore they are left to their own ways, and deceptions. Sadly, this is the manifest nature of the evolutionary beast. Anyone that seeks higher learning today will have to either accept evolution and thus be accepted by their athiestic colleagues, or make a stand for God and the more literal creation record of Genesis and be ridiculed as a fool. If one can hold the course, under continual pressure and ridicule, then one can truly advance in the fields of science and higher education and perhaps even make contributions that will help turn the tide.
Shlama,
Stephen P. Silver
If I was certain of your name, I'd address you as such. The book of Genesis is a pain in the neck for virtually all higher learning institutions in this generation, in the aftermath of Darwin's book "On The Origin of the Species". The question, Young Earth or Old Earth? would not arise if it was not for Darwin and the athiestic generation that coddled his point of view.
Genesis 1:20 begins the Fifth Day when God created living creatures in the sea, and birds in the sky. The phrase "nefesh khayia" is used to describe them. The fifth day ends in Genesis 1:23. Remember "nefesh khayia". Genesis 1:24 begins the sixth day, and again the phrase "nefesh khayia" is used, but this time to describe land animals. This phrase also appears in Genesis 2:7 to describe the formation of androgenous Adam along with the phrase "nishmat khayim". The phrase "nishmat ruakh khayim" appears in Genesis 7:22 when all humanity is destroyed in the flood. That's the basic framework used in Genesis. Call it a time framework if you will. Day as we know it is set by the revolution of the earth. Evening and morning is the result of a 24 hour period clocking the earth's revolution in space. We can speculate that the rotation of the earth was slower on the first day, but why would that be necessary? According to the text, no "nefesh khayia" were created till the fifth day and man, created on the sixth day is the only intelligent observer. It appears to me that it is a matter of faith to believe that the revolution of the earth was already fixed on the first day. I suggest that this is the point made in Hebrews 11:3. Now, evolutionists seem to need long, long periods of time to support the "short, but sure changes of evolution", as Darwin phrased it. Nevertheless, in our modern time it is the athiests that embrace his teachings, rejecting faith, not because there is something to be gained scientifically by speculating long days or changing periods of rotation of the earth, but because the Genesis record also contains the history of the sinful fall of humanity, shortly after his creation. If the evolutionist can somehow destroy the credibility of the Genesis record, he can also wipe out the very record that points to his sinfulness, as a descendent of Adam.
Every evolutionist is a descendent of Adam, namely living soul, "nefesh khayia" with the Breath of Life from God, "living nashama"(Genesis 2:7). It is this living spiritual nashama that gives humanity the ability to articulate and communicate with God. Sin is the very act that has severed our relationship with God. Darwinian theory and all that it claims cannot bring healing to the severed relationship between God and humanity.
Our learning institutions are dominated by athiests that have turned their backs on the Living God and cannot respond to His Spirit, as their Creator. Therefore they are left to their own ways, and deceptions. Sadly, this is the manifest nature of the evolutionary beast. Anyone that seeks higher learning today will have to either accept evolution and thus be accepted by their athiestic colleagues, or make a stand for God and the more literal creation record of Genesis and be ridiculed as a fool. If one can hold the course, under continual pressure and ridicule, then one can truly advance in the fields of science and higher education and perhaps even make contributions that will help turn the tide.
Shlama,
Stephen P. Silver