Replies

GourmetDan: I asked you to do a word study first. You didn't do it. Now you complain because I haven't yet given you one. Why the double standard?

GodGunsGuts: I have been asking you about your educational and career background for weeks. Yet, you refuse to tell me anything. Why are you complaining when I don't answer you immediately when you never answer anything? I have given you word studies on yom several times in the past. You've always ignored them because they conflict with your medieval young-earth viewpoint. The next time you whine about a word study, point to this post.

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GourmetDan: The word study you asked for is quite easy. And, to help you out, I am going to do the word study for you that I asked you to do. Every Christian who is intellectually capable (pretty much everyone) should be able to do a word study. I'll use Genesis 1:5 as the example because the remainder of the "days" are identical:

God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning--the first day. (Genesis 1:5)

I only studied Hebrew for a year and I freely admit that I am not even conversant, much less fluent. However, one of the things that is immediately obvious to the newest of students is that Hebrew has less words than English. That is why so many Hebrew words have multiple meanings.

ערב `ereb means evening.
בקר boqer means morning.
שני sheniy is an ordinal number meaning second.
יום yowm has a multitude of meanings (we'll assume now for the sake of YEC folks that it means a literal, 24-hour day.

The literal Hebrew translation says "evening, morning, a second day."

Note that yom does not use the definite article the. It does not mean the second day (hayyom sheniy), but rather a second day (yom sheniy). For what it's worth, my career over the past several years has changed so that the bulk of my time is spent writing about technical subjects rather than actually performing technical tasks. The presence or absence of a definite article may not mean a lot to some people, but it does to writers. More about this later.

Note also that the creation story includes ordinal numbers describing each "day." More about this later, too.

The Hebrew definition of yom

Now for the word study on yom. According to Strong's Concordance, it has these meanings:

1) day, time, year

a) day (as opposed to night)

b) day (24 hour period)

1) as defined by evening and morning in Genesis 1

2) as a division of time

a) a working day, a day's journey

c) days, lifetime (pl.)

d) time, period (general)

e) year

f) temporal references

1) today

2) yesterday

3) tomorrow

These definitions are agreed upon by Christian and Jewish scholars alike.

A few of many examples where yom does not mean a literal 24-hour day

This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day (yom) that the Lord God made earth and heaven. (Genesis 2:4)

So did God create the earth in one day or six? Is the Bible wrong or are YECs interpreting yom wrongly?

In the course of time (yom) Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. (Genesis 4:3)

Here, yom is referring to a period of time.

Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years (yom). (I Kings 11:42)

So did Solomon reign for forty 24-hour days or forty years? In this verse, yom means year.

Go now, write it on a tablet for them, inscribe it on a scroll, that for the days (yom) to come it may be an everlasting witness. (Isaiah 30:8)

The Bible used the word yom to mean forever.

I myself will guarantee his safety; you can hold me personally responsible for him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him here before you, I will bear the blame before you all my life (yom). (Genesis 43:9)

Here, yom means a lifetime or, in quite a few translations, forever. This year, I'm doing the Bible in a Year program by having portions emailed to me each day and listening to it on an MP3 player that my wife gave me for Christmas. I believe that staying in God's word is critical for the Christian life. I heard Genesis 43:9 last week and, to my ears, it sounds like forever best fits the context.

Now I stayed on the mountain forty days (yom) and nights, as I did the first time (yom)... (Deuteronomy 10:10)

In this verse, yom means a literal 24-hour day in one place and 40 days in another place.

The scientific evidence for an old universe and old earth

This is too vast of a subject to cover. The simple fact is that all of the scientific evidence points to an earth that is about 4.5 billion years old and a universe that is between 14 and 15 billion years old. Here are just a few examples of very wrong Young-Earth Creationist myths:

Radiometric decay could have been faster in the past: Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Someone brought this up on a previous thread. I and others responded that if radioactive decay in not generally linear (there are some well-known and well-studied exceptions), then it would have had to have been many orders of magnitude larger 6,000 years. Guess what happens when radioactive decay is very fast? A nuclear bomb!
Polonium halos prove that that the earth is young: Wrong.
The earth's magnetic field is declining and proves the earth is young: Wrong. The geological evidence proves that the earth's magnetic field has flipped many times in the past.
The recession of the moon proves a young earth: Wrong.
Growing body of evidence contradicts Big Bang: Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. The article that GGG referred to in this post claims this. It's simply not true. Yes, there are disagreements, but most are relatively minor. Just as Einstein improved upon Newton's theory of physics, scientists will certainly improve on the Big Bang Theory. It is extremely unlikely that it will be thrown out.
The speed of light used to be faster: Wrong.
Helium diffusion rates prove the earth is young: Wrong. Russell Humphreys is a hero to YECs. Yet he so badly misrepresents evidence and data that he has become a laughingstock. Now, GGG will tell you that Hugh Ross is afraid to debate Humphreys. The very opposite is true. Humphreys refuses to debate in front of an audience that includes trained scientists. Why do you suppose that may be?
There are no authenticated reports of meteorites embedded in sedimentary material: Wrong.
The sun is shrinking, proving that the earth is young: Wrong.
The Hebrew word yom combined with an ordinal always refers to a 24 hour day: Wrong. "Zechariah 14:7 contains the word yom combined with an ordinal (number one, echad), exactly as seen in Genesis 1:5." This fits with my observation that YECs understand the Bible about as much as they understand science. They have to create new (and demonstably false) theories about Hebrew grammar to fit with their belief about yom meaning a 24-hour day in the creation account.

Summary

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. (Psalm 19:1)

I've proven to you through scriptures that yom has a number of different meanings. God does not lie and his creation shows us that the earth is about 4.5 billion years old and the universe is about 14 -15 billion years old. That is 100% compatible with the Bible. Why insist upon a scriptural interpretation that contradicts what God has revealed to us through his creation?
Young-Earth Creationists throw up red herring arguments that are easily refuted.
Young-Earth Creationists would have you believe that God is lying to us through his creation. Lie is a strong word, but I cannot think of any other word that fits:

Why did GGG post an article claiming that there is a growing body of evidence that contradicts the Big Bang theory when there is so much observational data to the contrary?

Why do YECs claim that the current rate of decay indicates a young earth when there is a vast amount of scientific evidence that the earth has reversed polarity many times.

Why do YECs claim that radiometric decay was much faster in the past when even a first-year chemistry student would say, "Hey, that would mean a nuclear explosion."

As I pointed out in an earlier post, there were three untruths in the very first sentence of the article posted by GGG. Were these untruths intentional or unintentional? Given the fact that virtually every YEC article I've read either mistates the evidence, makes claims that contradict known facts, and has a title that is patently untrue, I have to believe that the majority are lying and they know it. I'll grant you that some are merely misinformed or ignorant, but if I posted an article saying that new evidence proves that the earth is not spherical, would you think that I was lying or merely lacking in understanding?

God speaks to us through general revelation in his creation, and through special revelation in his word. All truth is God's truth. He does not lie to us through his creation any more than he lies to us in the Bible.

As I showed above, Young-Earth Creationists would have you believe that God is lying to us through his creation. Why? In order to fit their medieval interpretation that "day" as used in the first two chapters of Genesis has to mean a literal 24-hour period. In the first part of this post, I pointed out the absence of the definite article the in the Hebrew. A literal translation goes something like this:

On day one, God created...
On a second day, God created...
On a third day, God created...

Because of the lack of the definite article, the Bible does not indicate that the days were consecutive. Much time could have passed between "day" three and "day" four. Again, this is consistent with scientific observations.

Why not accept God's truth as revealed to us through his creation and his word? Why cling to an obviously wrong interpretation of the Bible? I have seen many doubt their faith when their YEC views were confronted by reality (my first degree was from Baylor University, a Christian college). Today, I have to convince my peers that not all Christians are anti-intellectual and anti-science. I have seen the damage done by YECs -- that's why I'm so passionate about battling it.