To which view of the Creation days do you hold?

[iainduguid]

For people wishing to explore these ideas further, may I recommend my short book on the subject? I try to explore the pros and cons of the various views and help to explain why Christians might come to different conclusions on this topic.

Thinking About Science, Faith, and Origins: A (Very) Short Introduction - Kindle edition by Duguid, Iain. Religion & Spirituality Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

Thinking About Science, Faith, and Origins: A (Very) Short Introduction - Kindle edition by Duguid, Iain. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Thinking About Science, Faith, and Origins...

www.amazon.com

 

[Miss Marple]

The repeated phrase "morning and evening," even before the creation of the sun and moon, makes me believe they were days of standard length.

I almost chose "days of unspecified length" because I would not go to the wall for a few minutes or an hour or two, here or there. Just, generally, a basically understood and experienced "day." But, I thought the 24 hour option was more in the spirit of what was being asked. I don't think a day, for example, lasts a thousand years. I understand God is over time and does not experience it in the way we do; and thus says a day to Him is like a thousand years. The creation account doesn't read, to me, as though it is entering into that notion.

 

[VictorBravo]

The repeated phrase "morning and evening," even before the creation of the sun and moon, makes me believe they were days of standard length.

Except it’s “evening and morning,” which continues to intrigue me.

I can’t bring myself to say 24 hour days because I think that is a modern imposition on the text. But I take it to mean the length of time Moses or Abraham would consider a day.

 

[Ryan&Amber2013]

Please excuse my ignorance, but I feel like reading Genesis 1 in any way other than the plain reading of it goes against a clear teaching, does it not? As said above, each day ends with (as put by the NLT) "And evening passed and morning came, marking the first day." Is that not clear that God did this in actual days?

My friend: After evening passes and morning is here, I'll meet you at the market.
Me: Okay, I'll see you there in 100 million years.
My friend: Have you lost your mind?

 

[pgwolv]

2) Which of these views existed before Darwin's Origin of the Species? (1859)
3) How popular were these views before 1859?

According to the PCA and OPC reports:

• The Jewish apocalyptic Book of Jubilees, written most likely in the 2nd century B.C., says in 4:29-30: “At the end of the nineteenth jubilee, during the seventh week—in its sixth year [930.]—Adam died. All his children buried him in the land where he had been created. He was the first to be buried in the ground. He lacked 70 years from 1000 years because 1000 years are one day in the testimony of heaven. For this reason it was written regarding the tree of knowledge: ‘On the day that you eat from it you will die.’ Therefore he did not complete the years of this day because he died during it.”
  
  
• Augustine believed in instantaneous creation.
  
  
• Prior to the Assembly, William Perkins (1551–1600) made it clear that the first three days could not be solar days, because there was no sun. While opposing the instantaneous view of Augustine, he does not speculate as to their length, but declares that the days are “distinct spaces of times.” At least one member of the Assembly, John Lightfoot, argued that the first day was 36 hours, and that the seventh day was everlasting.
  
  
• Soon after the Westminster Divines, explicit evidence for the Day-Age approach appears, although among less than fully orthodox sources. Thomas Burnet (1635-1715), a chaplain to King William III until dismissed for some of his views on Genesis, argued that the six days might represent periods of undetermined length, in a work praised by his friend Sir Isaac Newton. Burnet’s view stemmed partly from his understanding that the sun was created only on the fourth day. In 1698, William Whiston, an English Baptist known to modern readers for his edition of Josephus’ works, regarded the days as years. The Dutch theologian Hermann Venema (1697-1787) opposed the view “that Moses speaks not of ordinary
  days but of years and of centuries,” showing that such a view was held by some in his circles in the 18th century.
  
  
• At the turn of the nineteenth century, prior to Darwin and in the wake of the new geology, Reformed Christians began to take a different look at the Genesis days. It was during this time that the two oldest alternatives to the Calendar Day view were developed: the Gap Theory and the Day-Age view. The Gap Theory was held by Thomas Chalmers and for a time by Charles Hodge. It is found in the original Scofield Bible. The Day-Age view, in varying forms and with varying emphases was adopted by orthodox Reformed divines on both sides of the Atlantic: Charles and A. A. Hodge, Warfield, Shedd and others in America, Shaw, Miller, James Orr, and Donald MacDonald in Britain. Kuyper and Bavinck in the Netherlands did not hold to the Calendar Day view, but are difficult to categorize in our terms. Meanwhile, the Calendar Day view continued to be articulated alongside these newer views by significant theologians and educators in Britain and America: Hugh Martin in Scotland, Ashbel Green, Robert L. Dabney, John L. Girardeau in the United States.
  
  
• A number of voices of concern were raised by nineteenth-century Calvinists about these newer views, e.g., Ashbel Green, in his Lectures on the Shorter Catechism (1841).
  
  

 

[pgwolv]

1) Other than the literal 6 day creation view - When, where, and why did these other views originate?

According to the reports:

• Day-Age view: Seemingly around the time of the new geology at the turn of the 18th century, pre-Darwin, to find concord with the apparent age of the earth.
• Day of Unspecified Length view: Bavinck, Warfield, and Young held to this, more or less the turn of the 20th century. It seems the biggest motivation for this view is to state no more and no less than what the Scriptures clearly state.
• Framework view: Articulated in 1958 by M. G. Kline articulated in his WTJ essay, “Because It Had Not Rained.” Stemmed from the conviction that Genesis 1 is communicating historical facts through a highly stylized literary narrative.
• Analogical Day view: Articulated in 1994 by C. J. Collins. Stemmed from the conviction that Genesis 1 is communicating historical facts through a highly stylized literary narrative.

 

[DanSSwing]

Let's ask some historical theology questions:

1) Other than the literal 6 day creation view - When, where, and why did these other views originate?
2) Which of these views existed before Darwin's Origin of the Species? (1859)
3) How popular were these views before 1859?

I don't have the answers but I am curious.

I know there were some Talmudic rabbis who taught pseudo-evolutionist views long before "Origin of the Species." Unfortunately, my source material, "Genesis and the Big Bang" is currently in storage. I do remember the book was using this as evidence FOR evolution, whereas I would take this as further evidence AGAINST it, as these rabbis had rejected the Messiah.

 

[Ploutos]

Two problems I have with some of the modern "alternatives" to a literal 6-day view:

1) They concede, a priori, the notion that the God who is free to create the world in whatever way he wanted could, apparently, do this anyway he wanted - except to create it in 6 literal 24-hour days.

2) In attempting to find a solution to this problem, many are looking at Scripture through a scientistic/rationalistic lens, detached from historical exegetical considerations of the text.

I'm not a fan of the Kline articles. He comes at the text with the assumed premise that we are able to construct a discernible, scientifically thorough timeline, and he lets his scientific quest lead him to the conclusion that Genesis 2:5 is THE interpretive key to this passage. I don't know the rest of Kline's work so I have no desire to detract from his reputation, but in my opinion these two articles, though eloquently argued, rest on foundational assumptions that are a couple of grades above nonsense. Frankly, I'm inclined to give equal weight to some of the more interesting patristic notions about creation, such as the idea that man "fell" from another plane/world/dimension into this one, or (to let discussion of Origen bleed into this thread) the notion of a cosmic battle between good and evil as the backdrop for the chaos of a universe "without form, and void". At least those notions are based on theological considerations, rather than on a uniformitarian quest to find in the Bible answers to scientific questions that in God's wisdom he deliberately chose not to address. The whole affair reeks of an overly scientific/naturalist-literalist worldview.

On the subject of origin of views, I would be interested to ask the same question about the 6-day view. Did anybody, prior to Ussher, hold to a literal 6-day view? Note that I'm not asking whether support for a 6-day is implicit in earlier ages - I'm fine with the idea that the doctrine developed and became explicit at such-and-such a point, just as I don't need for covenant theology to be explicit in 300 AD to believe in it; but I don't want to make tenuous arguments that it was explicit before it actually was.

 

[alexandermsmith]

I hold to the Biblical view

 

[John The Baptist]

I hold to the Biblical view

This doesn’t tell us which view you hold.

 

[RamistThomist]

This doesn’t tell us which view you hold.

Exactly. I hold to the biblical view, also. What are the odds?

 

[pgwolv]

On the subject of origin of views, I would be interested to ask the same question about the 6-day view. Did anybody, prior to Ussher, hold to a literal 6-day view?

From the reports again:

• Basil of Caesarea (330–379)...taught that the days were of ordinary length. It is perhaps worth hearing Basil explain his view in his own words: Why does Scripture say “one day the first day”? Before speaking to us of the second, the third, and the fourth days, would it not have been more natural to call that one the first which began the series? If it therefore says “one day,” it is from a wish to determine the measure of day and night, and to combine the time that they contain. Now twenty-four hours fill up the space of one day—we mean of a day and of a night; and if, at the time of the solstices, they have not both an equal length, the time marked by Scripture does not the less circumscribe their duration. It is as though it said: twenty-four hours measure the space of a day, or that, in reality a day is the time that the heavens starting from one point take to return there. Thus, every time that, in the revolution of the sun, evening and morning occupy the world, their periodical succession never exceeds the space of one day. But must we believe in a mysterious reason for this? God who made the nature of time measured it out and determined it by intervals of days; and, wishing to give it a week as a measure, he ordered the week to revolve from period to period upon itself, to count the movement of time, forming the week of one day revolving seven times upon itself: a proper circle begins and ends with itself. Such is also the character of eternity, to revolve upon itself and to end nowhere. If then the beginning of time is called “one day” rather than “the first day,” it is because Scripture wishes to establish its relationship with eternity. It was, in reality, fit and natural to call “one” the day whose character is to be one wholly separated and isolated from all the others.... Thus it is in order that you may carry your thoughts forward towards a future life, that Scripture marks by the word “one” the day which is the type of eternity, the first fruits of days, the contemporary of light, the holy Lord’s day honoured by the Resurrection of our Lord. And the evening and the morning were one day.

• Ambrose (c. 339-397) largely followed Basil’s treatment of the six days as 24-hour days.

• With the Venerable Bede (c. 673-735) there begins a trend in which commentators preferred to understand the six days to be real days, explaining Gen 2:4 by asserting that in the latter passage dies means “space of time,” not “day,” and that all things were created at once in the sense that the first heaven and earth contained the substance of all things, i.e., matter, which with Augustine they would not admit was made wholly without form, and which was formed in six days into this world. Bede does hold to 24-hour days, but realizes that an explanation is needed for the alternation of light and darkness in the first three days before the creation of the sun. He says that “the light was divided so as to shine in the upper and not the lower parts of the earth, and that it passed under the earth, making a day of twenty-four hours with morning and evening, precisely as the sun does.”
  
  
• In the western or Latin church...most followed Bede’s approach, sometimes combining various elements from both views as in the case of Robert Grossteste (c. 1168-1253), who also emphasized the literary structure of Genesis 1 with three days of ordering and three days of parallel adornment.
  
  
• Martin Luther acknowledged some of the difficulties in Genesis 1, alluding to Jerome’s comment that the Rabbis prohibited anyone under thirty from expounding this chapter, but he clearly held to six 24-hour days.
  
  
• Calvin does not directly address the issue of the exact nature of the days of creation in the 1559 edition of his Institutes but rather, discouraging speculation, refers his readers in a straightforward manner to the text of Genesis and to the help of such earlier commentaries as Basil’s Hexaemeron and the Hexaemeron of Ambrose. It should be noted that these commentators are explicit in their endorsement of a 24-hour view of the Genesis days.
  
  
• William Perkins, who wrote in his Exposition of …the Creede:…some may aske in what space of time did God make the world? I answer, God could have made the world, and all things in it in one moment: but hee beganne and finished the whole worke in sixe distinct daies."

 

[Ploutos]

Thank you @pgwolv - this is extremely helpful!

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I hold to the Biblical view.

 

[RamistThomist]

I hold to the Biblical view.

Reminds me of a quip from a Richard Muller essay on Karl Barth: if everyone's theology is Christo-centric, it's not clear what that term actually means.

 

[MyCrows]

Maybe the OP should add an option "Biblical view."

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Reminds me of a quip from a Richard Muller essay on Karl Barth: if everyone's theology is Christo-centric, it's not clear what that term actually means.

I forgot to mention that my theology is Christocentric.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

I thought I would be funny and just mention that my view is the Biblical view, but I was beaten to the punch.
It's not that I am sold out to a scientific explanation that attempts to answer all questions as to how the universe around us accords to a "normal day" view, but I don't think it's a good way to try to come up with some theory as to what the days represent on the basis of what we see in the world around us. A theistic evolution view, for instance, is riddled with all sorts of gaps and "just so" explanations as to how all life evolved from a Big Bang. Everyone is coming up with an explanation as to why things are here and I don't think we'll ever fully grasp the exact mechanisms that God used to create all that we see by the Word of His power.

I guess, in the end, I don't really concern myself much with it other than to focus on Divine Revelation. Even if I thought aspects of the account were poetic, it is still set in the context of a historical narrative. What "pressure" would force me to conclude the days could/must be longer or shorter? Some "certainty" that current observations and theories provide?

 

[Stephen L Smith]

This came up in my news feed. I have not had a chance to read it but it might encourage discussion points (from Creation Ministries)

Age of the earth

Earth is now generally accepted as 4.543 billion years old, but here are 101 evidences for a much younger age of the earth and the cosmos.

creation.com

 

[pgwolv]

Maybe the OP should add an option "Biblical view."

There is an option for "other"

 

[alexandermsmith]

This doesn’t tell us which view you hold.

That's the problem!

 

[pgwolv]

That's the problem!

So, I assume you are the "Other" vote? Do you believe that the Bible does not give enough information to prefer any of the other views?

 

[alexandermsmith]

So, I assume you are the "Other" vote? Do you believe that the Bible does not give enough information to prefer any of the other views?

I thought these polls were anonymous!!!!

I just don't like all these overly complicated names. I see no reason to think "day" in Genesis means anything other than day normally means. "Day" can be used poetically in Scripture but there is no indication we should read it as such here.

 

[pgwolv]

I thought these polls were anonymous!!!!

They are anonymous! If you want me to delete my message, I will do so.

I just don't like all these overly complicated names. I see no reason to think "day" in Genesis means anything other than day normally means. "Day" can be used poetically in Scripture but there is no indication we should read it as such here.

I understand, thank you.

 

[alexandermsmith]

They are anonymous! If you want me to delete my message, I will do so.

I'm only joshing

 

[RamistThomist]

I see no reason to think "day" in Genesis means anything other than day normally means. "Day" can be used poetically in Scripture but there is no indication we should read it as such here.

The response most would give would be the presence of "light" and "day" before the creation of the sun, which is how we measure days.

 

[TheInquirer]

The response most would give would be the presence of "light" and "day" before the creation of the sun, which is how we measure days.

Not a problem for God whatsoever and since He was the only one around doing the creating, observing, and reporting (angels dont count) that they were “days” and using the same language patterns throughout all of Genesis 1, with or without the sun, it is hard to exegetically defend days of varying lengths in my opinion.

Think about it, why would God use different periods of time throughout the creation process but then model our weeks and sabbaths after that same creation process?

 

[RamistThomist]

Not a problem for God whatsoever and since He was the only one around doing the creating, observing, and reporting (angels dont count) that they were “days” and using the same language patterns throughout all of Genesis 1, with or without the sun, it is hard to exegetically defend days of varying lengths in my opinion.

Think about it, why would God use different periods of time throughout the creation process but then model our weeks and sabbaths after that same creation process?

True, but it does point to at least one dissimilarity.

 

[alexandermsmith]

True, but it does point to at least one dissimilarity.

This is surely overcomplicating the matter. As said above, there was no person around to experience this period before the creation of the sun so what does it really matter? Scripture tells us Creation took six days and the Lord rested on the seventh, which is the Sabbath. The Sabbath is one normal, 24 hour day and the first Sabbath was the seventh day after the six of the work of creation. That is what we are told by God as to the period of creation. We should take Him at His word instead of trying to "scientifically" explain supposed inconsistencies.

 

[RamistThomist]

This is surely overcomplicating the matter. As said above, there was no person around to experience this period before the creation of the sun so what does it really matter? Scripture tells us Creation took six days and the Lord rested on the seventh, which is the Sabbath. The Sabbath is one normal, 24 hour day and the first Sabbath was the seventh day after the six of the work of creation. That is what we are told by God as to the period of creation. We should take Him at His word instead of trying to "scientifically" explain supposed inconsistencies.

I didn't say anything about science. My point was the very measurement used to determine how long a day is missing. It is similar to saying "sunrise" without having a sun present.