The Age

of the

Earth

 

 

 

By

David P. Reeve

 

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

THE SIX DAY CREATION

A Creation and an Appointing of Man

A Creation of Sea Animals and Birds But an Appointing of Land Animals

Billions of Years Before God Rested

Synonymous Parallelism of and ‘

Indistinguishable Usage of and ‘

Jesus and the Age of the Earth

The “Gap” of Genesis 1:2

The Grammar of Genesis 1:2

The “Was” of Genesis 1:2

Tohu and Bohu

Replenish the Earth

Dinosaurs

Accounts of Dinosaurs in Ancient Literature

Dinosaurs in the Bible

Behemoth

Leviathan

Evidence that Dinosaurs Lived Recently

Lucifer’s Rebellion in the Context of a Young Universe

Scientific Evidence the Earth is Billions of Years Old

Rock Ages and Radioisotope Dating

Distant Star Light

Scientific Evidence the Earth is Young

Rotation of Stars Around Galactic Centre is Too Fast

Rate of Helium Accumulation in the Atmosphere

Erosion Rate of the Continents

Decay of the Earth’s Magnetic Field

Salinity of the Earth’s Oceans

Radiocarbon Dating

Not Enough Sediment on the Ocean Floors

CONCLUSION

INTRODUCTION

We have been conditioned by the media to accept without questioning that the earth is billions of years old. An old earth is the “sacred cow” of evolutionists, because billions of years are needed for life to evolve. But is this unquestioned faith in an old earth justified? Is there really solid scientific evidence to support it? More importantly, what does the Bible have to say on the matter?

 

THE SIX DAY CREATION

Let us look into what the Bible has to say first. The following three scriptures give a wealth of information to the thoughtful reader about when God created the universe and how long it took Him:

 

Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

 

Exodus 20:11 For in six days Jehovah1 made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore Jehovah blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

 

Nehemiah 9:6 You alone are Jehovah; You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and everything on it, the seas and all that is in them, and You preserve them all. The host of heaven worships You.

 

It is clear that the heavens and earth and everything on it were made in six days. But do the heavens include outer space and the stars? Are these verses really saying that God created the whole universe in six days?

 

The Hebrew word translated heaven or heavens in the above verses is shamayim  שָּׁמַיִם which includes the sky (the space in which the clouds move, as well as the space where the celestial bodies revolve). Surely the intended meaning of Genesis 1:1 is that in the beginning God created the universe. But what are we to make of Exodus 20:11, which tells us that God made the heavens and earth (that is, the universe) in six days?

 

If created and made have essentially the same meaning, then these verses tell us that God created the whole universe in six days. However, if created and made have essentially different meanings, then these verses could refer to different events: perhaps a creation of the heavens and earth of unspecified duration billions of years ago and a making of the heavens and earth in six days a few thousand years ago.

 

Let us consider this second proposition further. The Hebrew word translated created is bara’ בָּרָא which means to create or fashion, and the Hebrew word translated made is ‘asah נַעֲשֶׂה which means to make, do, bring forth, fashion, appoint. So, could God have appointed the heavens and the earth and all that is in them in six days, which he had made billions of years ago? Unfortunately, this explanation has many problems.

 

A Creation and an Appointing of Man

If bara’ and ‘asah have separate meanings then there must have been a creation of man and then a subsequent making or appointing of him, for Psalm 100:3 and Genesis 1:26 tell us that God made man and Genesis 1:27 tells us that God created man. If there is such a distinction, then what is it? Surely there is no clear distinction and bara’ and ‘asah have the same meaning.

 

Psalm 100:3 Know that Jehovah, He is God; It is He who has made (‘asah) us, and not we ourselves; We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

 

Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let Us make (‘asah) man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

v27 So God created (bara’) man in His own image; in the image of God He created (bara’) him; male and female He created (bara’) them.

 

A Creation of Sea Animals and Birds But an Appointing of Land Animals

Further, if bara’ and ‘asah have two have separate meanings, then God created sea animals and birds but made (appointed) land animals, and did both to man! The way in which ‘asah and bara’ are used gives every indication they have equivalent meanings.

 

Genesis 1:21 So God created (bara’) great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

Genesis 1:25 And God made (‘asah) the beast of the earth according to its kind, cattle according to its kind, and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

 

Billions of Years Before God Rested

If the creation and making (appointing) of the universe are separate events that happened billions of years apart then why did God wait billions of years after His creation before resting?

 

Genesis 2:3 Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created (bara’) and made (‘asah).

 

Synonymous Parallelism of bara’ and ‘asah

A synonymous parallelism is where a thought is stated in one phrase and then repeated in different words in the next phrase. The following synonymous parallelisms show the equivalent meanings of bara and asah.

 

Genesis 2:4 This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created (bara’), in the day that Jehovah God made (‘asah) the earth and the heavens.

 

Exodus 34:10 And He said: “Behold, I make a covenant. Before all your people I will do (‘asah) marvels such as have not been done (bara’) in all the earth, nor in any nation; and all the people among whom you are shall see the work of Jehovah. For it is an awesome thing that I will do (‘asah) with you.”

 

Isaiah 41:20 That they may see and know, and consider and understand together, that the hand of Jehovah has done (‘asah) this, and the Holy One of Israel has created (bara’) it.

 

Isaiah 43:7 “Everyone who is called by My name, whom I have created (bara’) for My glory; I have formed him, yes, I have made (‘asah) him.”

 

Indistinguishable Usage of bara’ and ‘asah

The following two verses are not strictly speaking synonymous parallelisms, but they show the equivalent meanings of bara’ and ‘asah.

 

Genesis 6:7 So Jehovah said, “I will destroy man whom I have created (bara’) from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made (‘asah) them.”

 

Isaiah 45:18 For thus says Jehovah, who created (bara’) the heavens, who is God, who formed the earth and made (‘asah) it, who has established it, who did not create (bara’) it in vain, who formed it to be inhabited: “I am Jehovah, and there is no other.”

 

Considering the extreme problems with the idea that bara’ and ‘asah having separate meanings, we must conclude that they have essentially the same meaning. This leads to the conclusion from Genesis 1:1 and Exodus 20:11 that the heavens and earth and everything on it were made in six days. In other words the plain Bible teaching is that God made the whole universe in six days, those same six days in which he made man.

 

Jesus and the Age of the Earth

Does the New Testament shed any light on the age of the earth? Let’s take a look at how Jesus Christ viewed the age of the world.

 

Mark 10:6 “But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female.’”

 

Jesus viewed the “beginning of creation” as the time when God made Adam and Eve, not billions of years ago.

 

Luke 11:50 “that the blood of all the prophets which was shed from the foundation of the world may be required of this generation,”

 

He assured us that prophets had been around since the foundation of the world. The Greek for foundation is katabole καταβολή, which means founding or conception, and the Greek for world is kosmos κόσμος, from which we get the English word cosmos. So prophets have been around since the founding or conception of the world or universe. You can’t get much further back than that. It doesn’t leave any room for billions of years for the age of the world.

 

Paul also made it clear that people can clearly see God’s power by looking at the “things that are made”, and that people have been able to see this ‘since the creation of the world’, not billions of years after creation.

 

Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,

 

The New Testamentnot surprisinglyaffirms the Genesis account of the creation of the whole universe occurring in the creation week.

 

The “Gap” of Genesis 1:2

There is an explanation of Genesis 1:1-2 which allows for an old universe but a young “re-creation”, known as the “gap theory” which was popularised in the Scofield Reference Bible. It is the postulation that there is a gap of unspecified length between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2. The of matter of interest here is, can Genesis 1:2 be faithfully understood in such a way as to support such a gap? It should be noted that even if the Genesis 1:2 could be interpreted to allow for such a gap it would contradict the scriptures we have seen already. In other words the gap theory should be rejected because it contradicts the rest of scripture; however, for the sake of completeness let us look into it.

 

The Grammar of Genesis 1:2

Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

v2 The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

v3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.

 

The grammar of Genesis 1:2 does not allow for any “gap” between verse 1 and verse 2. The grammatical arguments are quite complex, but can be summarised thus:

1) The first clause of Genesis 1:2 is a noun clause. A noun clause is one in which the subject and predicate of the clause are nouns or their equivalent (especially participles).2
2) The Hebrew waw (translated “and”, “but”, “now”, “then”) at the beginning of Genesis 1:2 is a waw disjunctive (also known as a waw copulative) because it breaks the narrative sequence. (A waw consecutive continues the sequence.) Examples of the waw disjunctive follow. In each case the purpose of the verse, which begins with the waw disjunctive, is to explain something preceding it.3

 

Genesis 2:5 before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For Jehovah God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground;

v6 but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.

 

Genesis 2:9 And out of the ground Jehovah God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

v10 Now a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it parted and became four riverheads.

 

Genesis 2:11 The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which skirts the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold.

v12 And the gold of that land is good. Bdellium and the onyx stone are there.

 

3) The rules of Hebrew grammar state that:

“the noun clause connected by a waw copulative to a verbal clause, or its equivalent, always describes a state of contemporaneous with the principal action ...”4

In other words the description of the earth in Genesis 1:2a as being without form and void is a description of the earth at the time Genesis 1:1 happened! This means that the grammar does not allow for a gap.

 

The “Was” of Genesis 1:2

It has been argued that the phrase, “The earth was without form” in Genesis 1:2 should be translated, “The earth became without form”, or “The earth had become without form”. Such a translation allows for a gap of unknown time (possibly billions of years) between the creation of the heavens and the earth in Genesis 1:1 and the creation of light in Genesis 1:3 and all that follows. However, the Hebrew doesn’t favour this translation.

 

The Hebrew word translated was in Genesis 1:2 is hayeta הָיְתָה, the third person feminine singular form of the verb haya היה, “to be”. Recognised grammarians, lexicographers, and linguists have almost uniformly rejected the translations “became”, or “had become”, even when they accept the interpretation these translations are trying to prove.

 

Whilst “became” or “had become” are grammatically possible translations apart from other considerations in the context, the pluperfect “had become” is not a possible translation in view of the meaning of the pluperfect when connected to Genesis 1:1. Genesis 1:2 is circumstantial to Genesis 1:1, therefore the action of the pluperfect in Genesis 1:2 (if it be allowed) would have to take place before the action of Genesis 1:1, (for the purpose of the pluperfect is to describe an action which happens before the main action of the narrative).5 According to the pluperfect translation, the narrative would absurdly read:

 

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth had becomeprior to its creationunformed and unfilled. Then God said, “Let there be light”.

 

Tohu and Bohu

In Genesis 1:2 the words “without form” and “void” are translated from the Hebrew words tohu תֹהוּ and bohu בֹהוּ. Tohu also appears in Isaiah 45:18.

 

Isaiah 45:18 For thus says Jehovah, who created the heavens, who is God, who formed the earth and made it, who has established it, who did not create it in vain (tohu), who formed it to be inhabited: “I am Jehovah, and there is no other.”

 

Some people reason that since this verse clearly says that God did not create the earth tohu, and Genesis 1:2 states that the earth was tohu, then the earth must have become that way subsequent to its creation. However this argument has several fallacies:

 

1) The state of the earth, “without form and void”, was a transitory state from which God formed the waters and the land. When the earth is described as being “without form and void”, it is before the end of the first day. God did not finish the creation of the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, until the end of the sixth day, Exodus 20:11. (When a potter places a lump of clay on his wheel, it is without form, but it doesn’t stay that way for long.)

2) By looking at the whole verse of Isaiah 45:18, the phrase “Who did not create it in vain”, can be seen to mean “Who did not create it for the purpose of being without form,” but to be inhabited.

 

It is clear that Genesis 1:2 cannot be faithfully understood in such a way as to support the gap theory. Moreover, as mentioned before, the gap theory contradicts Genesis 1:1 and Exodus 20:11 and should be rejected.

 

Replenish the Earth

Whilst we are discussing Genesis it is worth mentioning another verse that is given in support of the Gap Theory. In Genesis 1:28 God instructed Adam and Eve to “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth” (King James Version). Some understand this to mean that the earth was to be filled again. However the Hebrew word translated replenish, male’ מִלְא, does not mean to re-fill but simply to fill. The New King James version renders it correctly as fill the earth”.

 

Dinosaurs

Some of the questions that naturally arise if the earth is only six thousand or so years old are: When did the dinosaurs live and why doesn’t the Bible mention them? Of course, the word dinosaur is quite a recent word and wasn’t around when the Bible was written, so it is not going to refer to them by that name. (The word dinosaur was invented by Sir Richard Owen, a famous British anatomist, from two Greek words, deino and sauros, which means “terrible lizard.”)6

 

Is it possible that dinosaurs lived as recently as a few thousand years ago? What is the evidence.

 

Accounts of Dinosaurs in Ancient Literature

There are numerous accounts of large reptiles in ancient literature, often referred to as dragons but which fit the description of a dinosaur. The most famous of which is probably Beowulf, in which the hero slays a monster and its infant that was terrorising and eating the inhabitants of a village.

 

Another account comes from John of Damascus who was a theologian of the Eastern Christian church in the 8th century (c. 675-749). He wrote an essay in which he quotes Dio Cassius the Roman (AD 155-236), who wrote the history of the Roman empire and republic:

 

One day, when Regulus, a Roman consul [3rd C. BC], was fighting against Carthage, a dragon suddenly crept up and settled behind the wall of the Roman army. The Romans killed it by order of Regulus, skinned it and sent the hide to the Roman senate. When the dragon’s hide, as Dio says, was measured by order of the senate, it happened to be, amazingly, one hundred and twenty feet long, and the thickness was fitting to the length.7

 

There is a Sumerian story dating back to about 3000 BC about a man named Gilgamesh who encountered a huge dragon when felling cedars in a remote forest, which he slew, cutting off its head as a trophy. Stories of dragons are quite common in some cultures. For example, the Welsh flag has a red dragon on it; the English have their folklore of Saint George who slew a dragon that lived in a cave; and dragons have always been prominent on Chinese pottery, embroidery and carvings, and have featured in many of its ancient stories.8

 

Dinosaurs in the Bible

The most reliable accounts of dinosaurs are found in the Bible. Starting in Job 38:4 God begins to ask Job a series of questions about His creation exposing Job’s (and our own) ignorance and helping us marvel at God’s handiwork. Initially the questions relate to the heavens and the earth and its weather. Then in Job 38:39 the questions relate to animals of which Job was clearly aware. Included in this list of animals is Behemoth (Job 40:15-24) and Leviathan (Job 41:1-34).

 

Behemoth

Behemoth was a huge creature. He had a tail like a cedar tree, Job 40:17, and his bones were as big as bronze beams and his ribs as big as iron bars, v18. Behemoth is not a poetic allegory as some try to argue. Behemoth was a real flesh and blood creature which God made when he made man, Job 40:15.

 

What could this creature have been? There is no known living creature that fits this description, however there are several dinosaurs such as the Brachiosaurus (measuring 75 feet long and 41 feet high) or the Supersaurus or Ultrasaurus (measuring up to 100 feet long), which do fit this description.9

 

Leviathan

Leviathan was a real creature that one could attempt to put a hook in, Job 41:1-2, or fill his skin with harpoons, v7, and a fearsome creature to do battle with, v8. Furthermore, Job was obviously aware of its existence as God uses it as an example of His awesome creative genius.

 

Again there is no known living creature that fits this description, however a creature such as Kronosaurus, an extinct marine reptile, does. It measured over 42 feet in length and it head was 9 feet long with sharp teeth.10

 

Evidence that Dinosaurs Lived Recently

Un-fossilised dinosaur bones have been unearthed in Alaska11 and a T. rex leg bone containing red blood cells was discovered recently.12 These show that dinosaurs lived recently because such findings would be impossible if the dinosaurs lived and died out millions of years ago.

 

The existence of dinosaurs at some time in the earth’s history doesn’t contradict a young earth. In fact, as we have seen, the historical, biblical and scientific evidence indicates that dinosaurs lived quite recently.

 

Lucifer’s Rebellion in the Context of a Young Universe

In the context of a young universe there is the question of when did Lucifer rebel against God? There are two passages that mention Satan being cast from heaven: Luke 10:18 and Isaiah 14:12; and two passages that mention Satan being thrown down to earth: Ezek 28:17 and Rev 12:9-13. Note that Isaiah 14:12 says of Satan “How you are cut down to the ground; however, this does not say that Satan was cast down to the earth. This is an important point because it means that the events of Isaiah 14:12-14 could have conceivably taken place before the creation of the earth.13

 

With this in mind, here are two possibilities that fit the scriptures:

1.  Lucifer rejoiced at the creation of the universe along with the other angels (Job 38:7), but then rebelled soon after the physical creation when he saw what God was doing: creating man in His image to rule the universe with Him. Perhaps Satan became jealous of man. (We do not know how fast time passes in the spirit world (2 Peter 3:8), so there may have been ample time for Lucifer to rebel sometime between the 1st day of creation and the day Satan tempted Adam and Eve). After His rebellion he was “cast down” from heaven (Isaiah 14:12).

2.  Lucifer rebelled before the creation of the universe and was “cast down” from heaven (Isaiah 14:12). In this case Job 38:7 would obviously not include Satan and his demons.

 

Although some of the details may not be clear, the scriptural accounts of Lucifer’s rebellion do not contradict a young universe.

 

Scientific Evidence the Earth is Billions of Years Old

Having looked at what the Bible has to say about the age of the earth, let us now take a look at scientific evidence.

 

Rock Ages and Radioisotope Dating

Radioisotope dating is the only ‘independent’ dating method used by evolutionists to date the earth. It can only be used to date volcanic rocks which contain some radioactive mineral. Apart from a few rare cases it cannot be used to date sedimentary rocks. Sedimentary rocks are dated by the fossils found in them. But how are the fossils dated, since fossils do not occur in volcanic rocks? They are dated by inference through their relationship to the samples of volcanic rocks that intrude the sedimentary layers. So there’s a lot of guesswork involved.14

 

To make matters worse, radioisotope dating has been known many times to be horribly inaccurate. Volcanic rocks in Hawaii from the Kaupeleehu Flow, Hualalai volcano which erupted in 1800-1801 were dated using the potassium-argon (K-Ar) dating method. (This method is often used to date volcanic rocks, and by extension the nearby fossils.) The “ages” for various samples that this method “dated” ranged from 140 million years to 2.96 billion years for rocks that are known to have cooled from lavas 200 years ago!15

 

How could the dating be so hopelessly wrong? Radioisotope dating in general depends on three assumptions:

1) The radioactive decay rate is constant.

2) The radioactive material must remain a closed system, that is, no parent or daughter material must be added or removed from the rock being dated. Percolating ground waters can do this. (In the case of K-Ar the system is assumed to be closed as soon as the rock hardens.)

3) At the point when the “clock is started” the amount of radioactive and radiogenic material (that is what the radioactive material decays into) is known. (In the case of K-Ar it is assumed that there is no argon in the rock when it hardened.)16

 

If any of these assumptions are invalid, it will give a wrong date. Obviously, at least one of these assumptions was wrong when obtaining the age of the lavas from Mt Ngauruhoe. The problem with radioisotope dating techniques is that they could all be out by many millions of years. The plain fact is that they cannot be relied upon to give accurate ages for rocks.

 

It is generally assumed that rock layers take years to form. However, violent events like the Flood described in Genesis can deposit layered rock formations very quickly. The Mount St Helens eruption in Washington State produced eight metres of finely layered rock in one afternoon. Coal, once thought to take millions of years to form, has been formed in a laboratory by heating wood, water and acidic clay at 150 C for 4 to 36 weeks is a sealed tube with no added pressure.17

 

If the account of Noah’s flood is true, which of course it is, then what would we expect to see today? Billions of dead creatures laid down in rock layers all over the earth. And what do we see? Exactly that. The fossils bear evidence of Noah’s flood, not an ancient earth. In fact, for the Christian who looks upon the fossil record as being laid down millions of years ago, he must answer the question: “Where is the geological and fossil evidence for Noah’s flood?”18

 

Distant Star Light

One of the objections given against a young earth is the fact we can see light from distant stars that are so far away it “must have taken” the light millions of years to reach the earth. There are a couple of explanations. One is quite complicated but basically appeals to Einstein’s theory of relativity to show how in the creation week when the earth aged seven days, the rest of the universe aged billions of years.19

 

Another explanation is that the speed of light was once much greater than it is today. In fact there is evidence that the speed of light is decreasing based on measurements since 1675.20
Yet another explanation is that God created light on its way from the stars to the earth, so that starlight could be seen from the earth as soon as the stars were created. Some might object that this could not be the case since God would be acting deceitfully in creating the universe with an appearance of age. This is clearly a false argument since God created Adam as a mature adult, so that he must have looked like a young man in his twenties or thirties even though he was not even a day old. Likewise God created fully grown trees that had they been felled would have shown many tree rings indicating great age, yet they were not a week old. If God chose to create mature plants and animals there is no reason why He might not also choose to create a mature universe.21

 

Scientific Evidence the Earth is Young

Evolutionists generally accept that the earth is several billion years old. As mentioned before, radioisotope dating is the only dating method used by evolutionists to date the earth. However there is good scientific evidence from a variety of other dating techniques that the earth is much younger than this. As one might suspect, these other techniques are not particularly well publicised because they are an embarrassment to evolutionists.

 

Rotation of Stars Around Galactic Centre is Too Fast

The stars of our galaxy rotate around the centre of the galaxy at different speeds. The observed rotation speeds are so fast that if our galaxy were more than a few hundred million years old it would be a featureless disc of stars instead of its present spiral shape.

 

This problem has been known about for over fifty years and applies to other galaxies. Although various theories have been devised to try to explain it they have all failed after a brief period of popularity.22

 

Rate of Helium Accumulation in the Atmosphere

Helium accumulation in the atmosphere is produced mainly from radioactive alpha decay from rocks. It is a well recognised problem that the amount of helium in the atmosphere is way too small for the rate of helium accumulation in the atmosphere, unless of course the earth is young. The measured rate of introduction of helium into the atmosphere is 13 million helium atoms per square inch each second! The theoretical rate of helium escape into outer space is about 0.3 million helium atoms per square inch each second. Thus helium is accumulating in the atmosphere at a very rapid rate; in fact it would only have taken two million years for the amount of helium in the atmosphere to accumulate from scratch. It would take less if the earth was created with helium already in the atmosphere.23

 

Erosion Rate of the Continents

Sedimentologists have researched many of the world’s rivers and calculated how fast the land is disappearing by the erosion of the rivers. The measurements show that some rivers are excavating their basins by more than 1000 mm (39 inches) of height in 1000 years, while others move only 1 mm (0.04 inches) in 1000 years. The average height reduction for all continents is about 60 mm (2.4) inches in 1000 years. This means that in one billion years a staggering height of 60 km (37 miles) of continent would have eroded, or put another way, North America should have eroded away in 10 million years.24

 

Decay of the Earth’s Magnetic Field

Since 1835 many measurements of the earth’s magnetic field have been made from which it is clear that the earth’s magnetic field is decaying at a remarkable rate. Every 1400 years the earth’s magnetic field loses half its strength. In 20,000 BC the strength of the earth’s magnetic field would have been 50,000 times stronger than it is today. The associated electric currents in the earth’s core would also be 50,000 times stronger than they are today, and the heating (proportional to the square of the current) would be 250 million times greater than it is today inconceivable that the earth cold have survived such heating.” This puts an upper limit on the age of the earth of 20,000 years.

 

Sometimes the objection is given that the earth’s magnetic field has reversed many times in the distant past. However, a period of rapid reversals after the flood but with an overall decay in the energy of the magnetic field fits in well with paleomagnetic, historic and present day data.25

 

Salinity of the Earth’s Oceans

The saltiness of the sea is increasing steadily. It is possible to calculate a maximum age for the sea based on the rates that salts go into and out of the sea. Granting the most generous assumptions to favour an old sea, scientists have estimated a maximum age for the sea of 62 million years. One of the assumptions was that the sea had initially no salt in it. Of course, if the sea started out being salty, which it probably was when God created it, then the calculated maximum age would be much less. Even a maximum age of the sea of 62 million years (and thus the earth it is on) is far younger than evolutionists’ dates for many marine creatures.26

 

Radiocarbon Dating

Ironically, radiocarbon dating can actually be used to give an estimate for the age of the earth. Radiocarbon is produced in the earth’s atmosphere and decays with a half life of 5,700 years. Assuming the earth started with zero radiocarbon and steady rates of production and decay, it would take 30,000 years for a state of equilibrium to be reached whereby the amount of radiocarbon in the atmosphere was constant. However, measurements show that radiocarbon formation exceeds decay and extrapolating backwards there would have been zero radiocarbon in the earth’s atmosphere 10,000 years ago.27

 

Not Enough Sediment on the Ocean Floors

Each year water and winds erode about 25 billion tons of dirt from the continents and deposit it in the oceans. About one billion tons of sediment is removed each year by tectonic subduction (that is the sea floor slides slowly beneath the continents taking some sediment with it). As far as anyone knows the other 24 billion tons per year simply accumulate. At that rate, erosion would deposit the amount of sediment in less that 15 million years.28

Whilst none of the above evidences for a young earth is proof, it is none the less evidence. Evolutionists would have people believe that the earth is billions of years old. Their only evidence for this is radioisotope dating which is known to have been horribly inaccurate. On the other hand there are other means of estimating the age of the earth which are independent of each other, which all give a far younger estimate ranging from thousands to millions of years. When examined carefully, it’s seen that the scientific findings fit more neatly with the idea of a young earth than they do with the idea of an old earth of billions of years.

Perhaps a few words should be said about the obvious question of, “If the earth is young then why do most scientists not believe it?” Probably for the same reason that most scientists are evolutionists. Influenced by Satan, mankind in general wants to reject God and go his own way. To do this he needs a viable alternative to biblical creation to explain his origins. The only “viable” theory of origins that doesn’t involve some deity is evolution, but this theory requires billions of years to have even a slight chance of organisms evolving. Evolutionists must believe that the earth is billions of years old, so they can’t possibly accept any dating method that indicates a young earth.

 

 

CONCLUSION

In looking at the issue of the age of the earth this paper has covered a range of topics. For the reader that wants to know more, there is an amazing amount of good quality literature available that covers this creation issue. For those with internet access https://answersingenesis.org/ is an excellent resource, and every good Christian bookstore will have a section on creation.

 

We have seen that the Biblical support for a young earth is plainly evident and that the scientific evidence for a young earth is ample. Some people when confronted with the evidence for a young earth exclaim that the age of the earth doesn’t matter, that it’s not part of the gospel, that it’s like arguing about genealogies, or they have some other such excuse. My response is: Why believe a lie when you can believe the truth?

 

David P. Reeve

Melbourne, Australia

d_reeve@yahoo.com

 

 

Copyright © 2002

Reformatted and annotated

5th December, 2020

 

 

 

 

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The Holy Bible - CHCoG Version - This translation from the original Hebrew and Aramaic is accurate and readable, giving you a clear understanding of how the New and Old Covenants are interlocked and God’s message to you.

Everlasting Life is God’s Gift - Does the Bible teach that you have everlasting life?  If not, how can you receive God’s gift of immortality as His child?

Fifty Years in the Church of Rome - Charles Chiniquy, a famous Catholic priest for 25 years, recounts his experiences that led him to God’s Gift of Salvation.

Jeshua the Messiah: Is He the Son of God or Part of a Trinity? - Explores the relationships between God the Father, our Lord Jeshua, the Holy Spirit and us.

Books of Moses - Fact or Fiction Series - Are the miracles recorded in Genesis and Exodus our true history?  Do the facts support Special Creation or the Big Bang & Evolution scenarios?  What about the Flood, Babel and the Exodus?

What is God’s Name? - How can we know what God’s Name is and how to Pronounce it?  Does the Bible teach us to use God’s Name?

The Ten Commandments - What are God’s Ten Commandments? How do they guide us in our relationships with God, our family and our neighbours?  Shows how obedience to Jehovah’s Instructions would result in true civilization.

God’s Calendar and the Sign of Jonah - Shows how God’s Calendar reveals that Jeshua truly kept the Sign of Jonah, His proof that He is the Messiah.

The Sabbath in Scripture - Has God’s Seventh-day Sabbath been ‘done away with’?  What does the Sabbath mean, and does God want us to keep it?

Sex, God and Families - Pamphlet exposing the dangers of sexual immorality and outlining the benefits of following God’s sexual principles.

Eastern Meditation and Jeshua the Messiah - Recounts the experiences of a CHCoG member who became a Christian while practising Eastern Meditation.

Spirit, Soul and Body - Take a deeper look at the Bible’s teachings about the composition of human beings and the roles of our soul and spirit.

Daystar’s Fall and the Age of the EarthWas Daystar (Satan) ever placed in charge of the earth? Did the earth exist prior to Creation Week?

Radiocarbon Dating - Shows how changes in radioactive carbon levels can drastically alter radiocarbon dates.  Not heavily technical.

Rome’s Challenge: Why do Protestants Keep Sunday? - This Roman Catholic article proves there is no scriptural basis for changing the seventh-day Sabbath to Sunday, and shows that the Roman Catholic church made the change.

Software

Calculated Biblical Calendar - Calculates dates of Annual Holy Days, Crucifixion, Flood, Creation: allows you to test the new moon visibility locally.

Radiocarbon Dating - Calculates the effects that changes in the geomagnetic field and radiocarbon/carbon ratios, etc, on radioactive dating.

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Endnotes

 

1 [CHCoG: Instead of the LORD, we have retained God’s Name of Jehovah יְהׂוָ֨ה where it exists in the Hebrew.  See God’s Name for an explanation of the importance of knowing Jehovah as God.]

2 Kautzsch, E. and Cowley, A. E. editors, 1972. Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar, Clarendon Press, p. 454, sect. 141i.

3 Fields, Weston W., 1994, Unformed and Unfilled, a Critique of the Gap Theory, Burgener Enterprises, p. 83.

4 Kautzsch and Cowley, Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar, p. 453, sect. 141e.

5 Fields, Weston W., Unformed and Unfilled, a Critique of the Gap Theory, pp. 103-104.

6 Colbert, Edwin H., 1984, The Great Dinosaur Hunters and Their Discoveries, Dover Publications, Inc., New York, p. 32.

7 The Works of St John Damascene, 1997, Martis Publishing House, Moscow.

8 Ham, Ken, 1999, The Great Dinosaur Mystery Solved!, Master Books, Inc., pp. 32-33.

9 Ibid., pp. 63-66.

10 Ibid., pp. 39-41.

11 Davis, B. et al, 1998, The Great Alaskan Dinosaur Adventure, Master Books.

12 Wieland, C., Sensational Dinosaur Blood Report, Creation Ex Nihilo 19(4):42-43, 1997.

13 [CHCoG: This is not possible, as in Genesis 1:31, Jehovah God says that everything was ‘very good’.  If Satan had already rebelled, everything would not have been very good.  See Daystar’s Fall and the Age of the Earth for more detail.]

14 Morris, John D, PhD, 1999, The Young Earth, Master Books, Inc., p. 51.

15 Ibid., p. 55.

16 Ibid., p. 47.

17 Organic Chemistry (6):463-471, 1984.

18 [CHCoG: It is also well known that dead organisms rapidly degrade.  The fact that there are billions of dead things preserved in the rocks all over the world demonstrates that they died and were buried rapidly in a massive cataclysmic event.]

19 Humphreys, Russell, 1995, Starlight and Time: Solving the Puzzle of distant Starlight in a Young Universe, Master Books.

20 Kelly, Douglas, 1997, Creation and Change, Mentor, pp. 144-150.

21 [CHCoG: Creating mature organisms is not the same as creating a universe with starlight that shows events which never actually happened.  The organisms were not created with memories and scars that revealed a history of injuries and recoveries which never happened. They were instead unblemished mature specimens, ready to begin living and reproduce.]

22 Scheffler, H. and H. Elasser, 1987, Physics of the Galaxy and Interstellar Matter, Springer-Verlag Berlin, pp.352-353, 401-413.

23 Morris, John D, PhD, The Young Earth, pp. 83-85.

24 Walker, Tas, Eroding Ages, Creation Ex Nihilo 22(2):18-21, 2000.

25 Ibid., pp. 74-83.

26 Austin, S.A. and Humphreys, D.R. The Sea’s Missing Salt: A Dilemma For Evolutionists, Proc. 2nd Internat. Conf. on Creationism, Vol II, Creation Science Fellowship, 1991.

27 Milton, Richard, The Facts of Life: “Shattering the Myths of Darwinism”, pp. 45-48.

28 John D Morris. PhD, The Young Earth, p. 90.