Posted on 11/07/2001 9:12:46 AM PST by JoeSchem
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November 7, 2001 The Reality of Ancient Catastrophism About fifty years ago, a Russian psychiatrist named Immanuel Velikovsky wrote a book, "Worlds in Collision." He suggested that much of the earliest history of mankind was deeply affected by catastrophic cosmic events. His suggestions seemed outrageous: that Venus is a comet that was ejected from Jupiter, and that its flybys past the Earth created the tidal forces that explained the Parting of the Red Sea and other miraculous incidents recorded in the Bible. Velikovsky's theories had one big problem: they assumed a highly unlikely coincidence. Evolutionists claim the Solar System has been around for billions of years, while human civilization has been around for mere thousands. How plausible is it that, just after humanity establishes its Velikovsky's theories are those of an atheist attempting to explain away ancient records of catastrophism. The ancients themselves attributed these catastrophes to divine intervention, but a good atheist cannot have this. So instead, he attributes the causes to a natural cosmic phenomenon. But a very bizarre, improbable natural phenomenon at that! At least Velikovsky understood one key fact about ancient history: a lot of strange things were going on back then! We recently learned ("Meteor Clue to End of Middle East Civilizations", News Telegraph, Nov. 6) that a two mile crater ring found in Iraq dates back to the time of the earliest civilizations in that region. A two mile crater is no small event -- and it occured within observation distance of the earliest cities of mankind, during their heyday. The Bible tells us that the ancient cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed by 'fire and brimstone.' These cities were once regarded as fable, but now scientists believe that they actually did exist, and actually were destroyed -- though non-divine explanations are presented ("Scientists uncover Sodom's fiery end," BBC News, 18 August 2001). And scientists have known for years that Minoan civilization -- which during the Second Millennium This volcanic eruption occured about the time that Moses was in Egypt. The smoke and debris from the volcano would have drifted south over Egypt, plunging the land into darkness -- just as the Old Testament account says. So you see, there are natural explanations for everything . . . except for the improbability of the timing. And it just gets more improbable, when we realize the frequency of such incidents in ancient history. And if God steered meteors and blew up entire islands to work his miracles on cue -- well, doesn't that make the miracles seem even more miraculous? Since the first century AD, we have no record of major cities -- indeed, whole nations -- being destroyed by meteor showers or volcanic eruptions. We've come to believe that such events are exceedingly rare. But apparently, during the time that the Bible was written, this sort of thing Frequent ancient catastrophism was a reality. That's not just what the Bible-thumpers like me are saying. That's what the secular archaeologists are saying. And just what, based on that, should you be thinking?. |
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