By Tin-chee Lo
Introduction
With the development of archeology and geology, ancient fossils and ape-men skeletons were gradually unearthed in modern times. Anthropologists claim that these “human-like” or “monkey-like” creatures existing hundreds of millions of years ago were ancestors of human beings. This is clearly contrary to the Bible teaching. Christians believe that the ancestor of mankind was Adam and Adam is recognized by people (both Christians and non-Christians alike) as a person who lived about, say, ten thousand years ago. Christians who support the “Young Earth Creationism” cannot reconcile the Bible with the archaeological and geological data. Their only way out is to assert that, scientific data in general, and the archaeological and geological data in particular, are unreliable as far as the age of the earth is concerned.
This assertion can hardly convince scientists and intellectuals. Such Christians are not only being regarded by the learned communities as ignorant, but also greatly weaken the credibility of the Bible which they take as their authority. This is obviously detrimental to evangelism which Christ charges them to carry out.
However, if we allow “the sixth creation day” to be a long period of time rather than just a twenty-four hours day, then these many paleoanthropological phenomena can have a chance to be explained.
Two Stages of the Sixth Day
The epilogue of “Sixth Day” in the creation story reads: “God saw everything he had made, and behold, it was very good. There was evening and there was morning, which was the sixth day (Genesis 1:31).” Many things had happened before this ending statement. This ” sixth day” can be divided into two stages. The first stage is all God’s work; the second stage regards God’s creation of Adam and Eve and their (especially Adam’s) responsibilities.
- The first stage describes the creation of living creatures such as livestock, insects, wild beasts as recorded in Genesis 1:24 including dinosaurs, ape-men, and other paleontological species. If this stage lasted for a very long time in billions of years, then we would have no problem explaining the existence and antiquity of fossils and ape-men skeletons, and it would be possible to harmonize scientific data with the biblical narrative. But a new question arises. Does paleo-anthropologists imply that death existed before the emergence of sin? Does this seem to go against the teachings of the Bible? We shall explain it later.
- The second stage, also the final stage, of the Sixth Day deals with the creation of man, that is, the creation of Adam and Eve. First, we must note that Adam was always only human, whether before or after he sinned. God did not make him a superman, nor a god-like man. He is physically, intellectually and emotionally limited just as we are. But physiologically, Adam is no different than those ape-like animals created in the first stage, because both are made from dust out of the ground (Gen. 2:7, 19).
Definition of Human
The key difference between Adam and the ape-men is that Adam received the breath of life from God (Genesis 2:7), and most importantly, he was made in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:27), so he was uniquely called a “living being.” This term applies only to Adam (including Eve) and their descendants and serves as the very definition of mankind. In other words, ape-men are not human beings although they may look like outwardly. Therefore, ape-men are not our ancestor, Adam and Eve are. Christians should not let anthropologists’ speculative assertion about the age of humans shake their confidence in the authority and credibility of the Bible.
God gave Adam works to do
After Adam was created, God immediately gave him a task to manage this huge Garden of Eden. This wasn’t an easy task, nor could it be done in 24 hours. In the process of doing this work, Adam felt satisfied initially, but doing the same things repeatedly, especially jobs involving labor, would make him bored and distressed over time.
In addition to the labor job, God gave Adam an intellectual job which was another challenging assignment, which was to name all the animals. Today we call it “taxonomy” which is the starting point of all sciences. Because all sciences begin with naming and classifications. It took 18th-century naturalist Carl Linnaeus several decades to classify the then-known species in Europe.
Granted, in the Eden era, species may have been much simpler, but it was still impossible to give unique names to all creatures within a twenty-four-hour timeframe. Also, memorizing these names requires a systematic structure. Adam had to establish a nomenclature system first before he could begin to assign names to the living beings.
Adam’s Limitations and the need for a helper
Let me emphasize again that Adam was just a human being, and he was just like us (it should be said that we were just like him). Although he had the rich presence and help of God, God did not turn him into a “superman” or a “god-man”. Therefore, Adam’s physical strength, intelligence, and spiritual endurance were limited. Long-term physical and mental work made him feel helpless and empty. Therefore, the last part of the “Sixth Creation Day” cannot be shorter than 24 hours.
Some may say that God’s instructions to Adam to take care of and guard the Garden of Eden (physical strength) and to name various creatures (intelligence) were just instructions and did not expect Adam to complete them within the Sixth Day. But I believe that God at least required him to actually carry out these works on the Sixth Day, so that Adam could truly feel that “it is not good to be alone” in his human nature, as “Genesis 3:18” says. Because a man does not feel lonely when they are alone in the short term, but rather feel free and at ease. However, when he falls alone for a long time, he will gradually feel psychologically lonely. This feeling takes a long time to develop. At this juncture, God had compassion on Adam’s soul and body, and created Eve from his rib for him. Eve appeared before Adam and became his wife. It is important to note that these two instructions were issued before the phrase, “And there was evening, and there was morning-the sixth day”, which should be consistent with the interpretation of this phrase for the other five days, that is, all the descriptions before this phrase are practical works rather than abstract edicts.
If you are to read Genesis casually, you will get the impression that God made Eve immediately after Adam was created. In fact, it was not true. It was only when Adam felt physically and spiritually restless then God created Eve for him, this suggests that there ought to be a long period of time in between, which again means that the “Sixth Day” could not be a 24-hour day. This does not mean that God’s ability is limited, but that human limitations require the “Sixth Day” be a rather long period of time.
Explanation of Ape-Men and Global Flood
Genesis 6:3 reads, “At that time there were great men on the earth. Then the sons of God conceived with the daughters of men and had sons, and they became the mighty and famous men of old.” Who are these “sons of God”?
Although the descendants of the ancient ape-men (great men) did not possess the breath of God as Adam’s descendants do, they were nonetheless had the same physiological made-up as Adam’s descendants, so when these ape-men had intercourse with Adam’s female descendants, they together could produce children which presumably were called the “mighty and famous men of old” in the Bible. This mixed race could not be considered as the descendants of Adam. God was furious when he saw the situation of confusing racial identities. God’s surefooted way was to send a flood to completely wipe out all the living creatures of unclear origins, leaving only Noah’s family of eight who were unquestionably “pure offsprings of Adam.”
This proves indirectly that the flood must be global rather than regional. We don’t need to appeal to geological data to explain the universality of the flood. Of course, because it is indeed true, the above biblical explanation must cohere with scientific observations — and it does. Although the population at that time had not spread all over the earth as it has today, the global flood does provide the post-flood human beings with the assurance that they are the descendants of Adam.
This guarantee is significant: The salvation of Jesus Christ was designed for the descendants of Adam, not for angels or other creatures with non-adamic elements. Since we already know for sure that we are descendants of Adam, so there is no need for us to doubt whether God’s salvation is applicable for us or not. More importantly, the “human” side of the incarnate Christ is a “real man” which affirms the effectiveness of the redemption of Jesus Christ. He was indeed “the seed of the woman” (Genesis 3:15).
Death before the Fall and the myth of fossils
Romans 5:12 reads, “Just as through one man sin entered the world, and through sin death came to all men, because all have sinned.” Doesn’t this clearly say that death can only appear after Adam and Eve sinned”?
The word “death” in the Bible has multiple meanings:
- “Physical Death” is the separation of soul and body.
- “Spiritual Death” refers to the state of alienation from God after man has sinned. After the Fall, all Adam’s descendance are dead in their transgressions and sins when they are born, and “rebirth” which means believing in Jesus by the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, is the only solution.
- “Eternal Death” refers to the verdict of the final judgment in front of the great white throne. The fate of those who do not believe in Jesus Christ is to be thrown into the lake of fire, where they will never be able to recover.
Therefore, when it comes to “death” in Romans, we have no reason to interpret it exclusively as “physical death.” It is more reasonable to interpret it as “spiritual death.” The Bible says that when Adam and Eve sinned, they were immediately separated from their relationship with God. This is exactly what Genesis 2:17 means, “for in the day you eat of it you will surely die.” Adam eventually experienced “physical death” when he lived to the age of 930 after his spiritual death. This reprieve was all God’s grace.
As for whether there is “physical death” before Adam’s sin, or even before Adam’s existence, we cannot say with absolute certainty. But if I say “Yes”, my answer does not violate the teachings of the Book of Romans, rather, it resolves the mystery of the existence of a large number of fossils and ancient ape-men’s bones.
I tend to believe that “physical death” existed before Adam sinned. The reason is that when God said to Adam in Genesis 2:16, “In the day you eat of it you will surely die.” God assumes Adam knew what “death” meant otherwise the communication breaks down. Adam fully understood God’s prohibition. If there had never been “death,” then there would be a great obstacle to God’s communication with Adam. Furthermore, Adam and Eve and other animals all needed to eat fruits and vegetables before the Fall, so at least the death of plants was something Adam had understood. So, we have no reason to believe that physical death did not exist before Adam sinned.
Now a hypothetical question arises: If Adam and Eve had never eaten the forbidden fruit, (of course they would not experience “spiritual death”) would they experience physical death? I cannot be sure. But even if they would, it would not violate the teaching of Romans insofar as the meaning of “death” is properly interpreted. Another thing we need to take note is that though “physical death” seems to be a very terrible thing to people but to a much lesser degree to God. This is why one of the Ten Commandments sanctions, “Thou shalt not kill.” But in the eyes of God, “physical death” is not that serious. We often read in the Bible that God took the lives of people (even saints) for good reason because God has the power to restore life but people have not.
Science and Genesis
Now we see that if we accept the hypothesis that the Sixth Day is not a “24-hour day”, we have great explanatory power to reality. But if we stubbornly insist on the claim that the Sixth Day must be a twenty-four-hour day, then the Bible and scientific data can never be reconciled. Why do science and the Bible should be able to integrate in coherence and not stand in opposition to each other? The short answer is that they both come from the same source.
The Bible is inerrant and cannot contain errors. We call this the doctrine of “biblical inerrancy” or “the infallibility of the Bible” as the most basic believe of Christianity. But the “interpretation of the Bible” can err, and it has happened in history. The Bible is the truth, but there is also truth outside the Bible (such as science). Otherwise, we would only need to read the Bible and no need to go to college to study. Theologian Francis Schaeffer was right when he said, “All truth is God’s truth.” However, if conflicts between the “biblical truth” and the “truth outside the Bible” emerge, the Bible must be on the right side. This is what the term “the authority of the Scripture” means.
There are four possibilities for the relationship between the Bible and science:
- Bible interpretation is correct, science is incorrect (the ancient “flat earth theory” vs. the biblical “round earth theory”)
- Bible interpretation is wrong, science is correct (Copernicus’ “heliocentric theory” vs. Catholic “geocentric theory”)
- Correct Bible interpretation, and correct science (this article’s explanation of the “Sixth Day”)
- Both are wrong (liberals’ view on miracles)
Cosmological Evidences
Those who oppose science cannot justify themselves. Those who are holding mobile phones or iPads in hand to give a presentation to justify their anti-science position to the audience have forgotten that the electronic devices they are using are products of science. More importantly, these tools are built based upon the most basic scientific principles. Astronomers of modern times use the same scientific principles to build various astronomical telescopes to calculate the age of the universe. Their results consistently indicate that the universe began to exist 13.7 billion years ago.
This long age not only shows that the universe had a beginning, consistent with the first verse of Genesis Chapter 1, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,” but also explains that the “Day” mentioned in Genesis have to be a long period of time rather than a 24-hour-day. If the Sixth Day is not a 24-hour-day, there is no reason to demand other days be 24 hours. In fact, some days (Genesis 1:3-5) do not require 24 hours, such as the first day when God said, “Let there be light” and instantly there was light.
Does long Sixth Day violate the Bible interpretation?
The answer to this question is crucial. If the above explanation violates what the Bible author meant to say, you have wasted your time reading it. But if not, we have something to ponder upon. Genesis Chapters 1 and 2 record that God created the universe in six days. People’s first understanding of the word “day” is a twenty-four-hour “day”. But “day” in Hebrew is “YOM” which has multiple meanings: it can mean twenty-four hours, or it can mean different forms of “indeterminate periods of time.” Therefore, when we say that the Sixth Day is a time period of much longer than 24 hours, we are not saying anything unbiblical.
Evolution
Many people think that those who advocate Old-Earth Creationism must have been influenced Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. This is why some Young-Earth creationists spent a lot of time to disprove evolution in the context of refuting the Old-Earth Creationists. Of course, evolutionists have to believe that the earth is old, but this does not mean that Christians who believe in Long Creation Days are influenced by the evolutionary ideas. Creation-Date and Evolution are two separate topics, linking them together is like comparing oranges with apples. This is why the word “evolution” does not appear in the text above, as it has nothing to do with the purpose of what we are discussing.
Conclusion
If we insist that the Sixth Day must have been a twenty-four-hour day, there is absolutely no chance for science and the Bible to agree. But if we allow the Sixth Day to be a long period of time which the Bible does not disagree, then we have acquired a great deal of explanatory power to reality, such as fossil records, dinosaurs, the origin of man, the global flood, and some hard sayings in Genesis. It is my prayerful hope that readers may open their minds to explore the contrarian views to find out which one is more reasonable, not in an absolute sense but in a comparative sense.
