Deuteronomy 4 and the Age of the Earth

When did human history start?  A reasonable estimate by mainstream dating takes us to around 2500 BC. [1]  This only goes back to the post-Babel era.  Noah went into the Ark 1656 years after Creation Week.  Thus, a 6K year old world makes sense. 

Let's give thought to Deuteronomy 4: 32-35,

Ask now about the former days, long before your time, from the day God created human beings on the earth; ask from one end of the heavens to the other.  Has anything so great as this ever happened, or has anything like it ever been heard of?  Has any other people heard the voice of God speaking out of fire, as you have, and lived?  Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another nation, by testings, by signs and wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, or by great and awesome deeds, like all the things the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?  You were shown these things so that you might know that the Lord is God; besides him there is no other.

Because of the signs and wonders, the Israelites had assurance that the Lord was the true Guardian of the Universe.  How could the Jews verify this?  Look at history, "Ask now about the former days, long before your time."  Is seems most likely that Adam, Noah and the other patriarch's wrote Genesis and then Moses edited their writings.  That is, history goes back to Adam.      

The famous Library of Alexandria was founded around 300 BC and had 200K to 400K books by some estimates.  Did some of these works contain pre-Flood history?  If so, there may have been a number of ancient chronicles that went back to the first human generation.

Christians who hold to a long chronology sometimes put Adam as far back as 150K years ago.  Where is all that history?  According to a report in NewScientist, writing may go back 35K years.  What happened to the missing historical accounts?  Some propose that the Sumerian King List takes us back 7K years before the Global Flood - that's far short of 150K years! [2]

Another problem for old earth supporters is all the millions of years of death and suffering before the Fall.  In Genesis 3 we read of the curse of the Earth.  Death and thorns came after the Fall in a straightforward reading of the text.  And later, the planet itself was destroyed because the world was wicked (Gen. 6:13).  That man's sin can have negative consequences in nature is repeated in Deuteronomy 28:

... if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come on you and overtake you ...  You will sow much seed in the field but you will harvest little, because locusts will devour it.  You will plant vineyards and cultivate them but you will not drink the wine or gather the grapes, because worms will eat them.  You will have olive trees throughout your country but you will not use the oil, because the olives will drop off. (Deut. 28:15, 38-40)

Notes:

1)  YES - Young Earth Science by Jay Hall (IDEAS, Big Spring, TX, 2014), pp. 30-33.

2)  Ibid., p. 33.

*illustration:  Sargon of Akkad & the tree of life

Toledoths and Genesis

There are 10 “Toledoths” which unite Genesis and demonstrate that the entire book is consecutive history.  Toledoth means “this is the history of.”

Archaeologist P.J. Wiseman wrote New Discoveries in Babylonia about Genesis in 1936.  Wiseman found certain characteristics of ANE (Ancient Near Eastern) literature:   

1. Records begins abruptly with no heading   
2. Each tablet ends with a toledoth statement referring to what has been written before   
3. The name in the toledoth statement refers to the writer or owner of the tablet

Donald Wiseman has edited an updated version of his father’s work, Clues to Creation in Genesis, and has provided more evidence that the toledoths are at the end of each section and denote the author.  Here are the 10 toledoths:

Heavens & Earth (2.4)           Adam (5.1)

Noah (6:9)                              Noah’s sons (10.1)

Shem (11:10)                        Terah (11:27)    

Ishmael (25:12)                     Isaac (25:19)

Esau (36:1) [1]                      Jacob (37:2)    

Charles Taylor provides a helpful insight on the first toledoth, “Who, then, was the writer of the first record?  Was it Adam, instructed by God, or could it even be God himself, writing as he wrote the ten commandments?”  In Exodus 31:18 we learn that the Ten Commandments were written by the finger of God.

How does this apply?  Consider the account of Abraham offering up Isaac:

Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah.  Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”  Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey.  He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.  On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.  He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.” (Gen. 22:2-5)

Abraham started off toward Mount Moriah on the next morning – not millions of years later.  On the third day (3 normal 24 hour days) of Abraham’s journey he separated from his servants.  These days were not periods of undefined length where events may have been out of sequence.  According to advocates of Old Earth Fallacies (OEF’s) Genesis gives an order of events contra Big Science:

Earth before the sun           Light before the sun

Plants before the sun          Man before thorns

Fruit trees before plants     Trees before land animals

Flowers before bees          Birds before dinosaurs                   

So we must take Genesis 1-11 as real history and not inject millions or billions of years into the text.  Creation Week tells of the Lord making the heavens and earth with its plants and animals, including mankind, in 6 earth-rotation days.  Before Day1 there was no light and prior to Day4 the sun did not exist.  Stand up for Genesis – Truth Matters. 

“I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?” (Jn. 3:12)

Note:

1) There is a repetition in Gen. 36:9.

God, Adam & You

The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals has a very helpful audio resource – In the Beginning:  God, Adam and You.  This is an excellent defense of the historicity of Adam.  The speakers include Joel Beeke, Kevin DeYoung, Liam Goligher, Richard Phillips and Derek Thomas.  The Lord Jesus Christ is "the last Adam" (1 Cor. 15:45) so this topic is important.  Dr. Beeke has a video describing his talk.

One speaker is confused on the toledoths (“these are the generations of”) in Genesis.  P.J. Wiseman has provided strong evidence that these appear at the end of a section.  Thus, Adam, Noah and Shem provided eyewitness accounts and Moses compiled these.  Adam is mentioned in the genealogies so he is a real historical figure (1 Chr. 1:1, Lk. 3:38 etc.). 

It is often said that Genesis tells us why God created but not how.  One presenter counters that view (Heb. 11:3, Ps. 33:6, Gen. 1:3,6,9 etc.).  One speaker misses the mark on the dinosaur and large aquatic reptile mentioned in Job 40 and 41.  The fact that Adam was prophet and priest is detailed.

The views of Tim Keller and BioLogos are confronted.  Theistic evolution goes against what we read in Psalm 8:

What is mankind that you are mindful of them,

    human beings that you care for them?
You have made them a little lower than the angels
    and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
    you put everything under their feet (Ps. 8:4-6, NIV).

One of Rich Mullins' (Ragamuffin) songs is even referenced:

Well, they said, "Boy you just follow your heart"

But my heart just led me into my chest
They said, "Follow your nose"
But the direction changed every time
I went and turned my head

And they said, "Boy you just follow your dreams"
But my dreams were only misty notions
But the Father of hearts and the Maker of noses
And the Giver of dreams, He's the one I have chosen
And I will follow Him

The moral of this song is that we should not fall to the pressure from academic elites who want us to deny a real Adam.  Jesus believed in an historical Adam so should we (Mt. 19:4,5; Mk. 10:6-8).  I saw Mullins twice and was deeply moved.  Mullins was part of an event where creationist leader Paul Ackerman (It's a Young World After All) spoke at.

We can’t go back to Eden; the Flood destroyed it, but if we could would there be a sign there saying “Former Home of Adam & Eve”?