Why I Believe the World Was created in Seven Twenty-four Hour periods of Time
WHY I BELIEVE CREATION HAPPENED IN SEVEN 24-HOUR PERIODS
By
John W. Schmitt
Some time ago a cousin of mine had heard an individual give a presentation about evolution and creation. My cousin then sent some information to me about the event and asked my opinion. Not long after, while speaking at a retreat on the
The subject seems to come about as a result of the view I have of the Bible as a whole. I consider the Bible to be a story of “Universe Lost and Universe Regained”. The Bible begins with the story of creation. We learn that God considered the creative act to be “very good”. The Bible goes on to tell us that it did not take long for man to disrupt God’s very good creation by sinning against God, thus throwing the entirety of creation into a state of corruption. The rest of the Bible is the story of what God is doing, and intends to do, to bring the world back to Himself and make it even better. The prophecies of a future temple and a new heaven and new earth are connected to the creation because the future is God’s conclusion to the fall of man. Therefore, on occasion, I get asked how I view the beginning of things.
My basic premise is that the Bible is true by its very nature. Therefore, everything in it expresses truth on whatever subject is being presented. So, when it comes to science and the Bible, I believe it is man’s mission to discover how science fits the Bible. We get it backwards when we try to make the Bible fit science. The Bible says God created the universe in seven (7) twenty-four (24) hour periods, and therefore, this is what I hold to be true..
Some will say that I have just bought the party-line and am not thinking for myself. The reality is just the opposite. Years ago I believed in what some call Theistic Evolution. I accepted the idea that the days of Genesis chapter one were really evolutionary ages and that God just used the concept of days because that is how people of the time thought. As time has passed I have come to realize this concept could not be further from the truth. So, let us begin an exploration of how I came to believe the Bible’s words to be literally true.
Talking with people over the years I have come across those who believe the Bible is a “take-off” from ancient religious belief. They believe God had Moses write the words of Genesis the way he did in order to help ignorant nomads (ie: early Jews) understand the all powerful nature of God. He did not intend for man to take His Word literally. These people have told me that the creation story of Genesis is basically the way Egyptians of the day thought, thus the way that the Hebrew slaves would have been taught.
This view of Genesis totally misrepresents the facts. My problem with this view began to develop as I began to understand exactly what was believed by the Egyptians about the creation of the world. According to the ancient Papyrus Brehmer-Rhind (which can be found on the internet), the creator God of the Egyptians was Atum.
In the Papyrus Atum is quoted as saying:
“All manifestations came into being after I developed…no sky existed no earth
existed…I created on my own every being…my fist became my spouse…I
copulated with my hand…I sneezed out Shu… I spat out Tefnut produced Geb
and Nut…Geb and Nut then gave birth to Osiris…Seth, Isis, and Nephtys…
ultimately they produced the population of this land.”
I have a hard time convincing myself that the above quote sounds anything like the words of Moses in Genesis Chapters one, two, or three. According to Ancient Egyptian thought, it was the sexual exploits of the God Atum that brought everything into existence. According to the Bible, it is the power in the voice of God and His infinitly creative intellect that brought everything into existence.
Others believe what we have in Genesis is a retelling of creation as seen by the Babylonians; that while the Jews were in captivity in
Here again, the description of how the earth was created is far different than what the Bible states. Let me quote from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia of the internet:
“In the much later Enuma Elish, of
Tiamat and Aqsu, upset by the chaos of the younger gods, attempt to take back
creation, until the son of Enki, Marduk, defeated them and recreated the world
out of Tiamat’s bodies… Other myths tell of the creation of human kind. The
younger Igigi gods go on strike, refusing the work of keeping the creation
working and the gods consulted Enki for a solution. He suggested humankind be
made from clay, mixed with the blood of the captured God Kingu, son and
consort of Tiamat.”
The Bible does not describe anywhere the idea that the creation of the world came about as a result of conflict amongst the gods; nor does it indicate that mankind was developed as an after-thought to solve an employment problem in the god-world. Even the stated creative act of making humans is not the same. Never does the Bible mention in any sort of a way that man was created from the blood of God.
The Bible does indicate that there was unity in the Triune God; and that man was the crowning achievement for which the entire creation was made. The only similarity in the stories from Ancient Babylon and the Bible is that man is made from clay; but man received his life from the breath of God, not His blood.
Therefore, the idea that the Biblical text is a “take-off” of ancient religious belief seems to go contrary to the simplest of logic. If one takes the literal words as they are written, it becomes obvious that the Bible’s description of creation is unique and stands alone. It is like no other; it does not match anything that has been told from the past. Thus, as a thinking person trying to deal with truth in integrity, I can not accept the idea that the Biblical text was developed from ancient mythology.
If I am to pursue the idea that the Bible is to be taken literally; the first task before me is to discover the meaning of the Hebrew word “day’ as used in Genesis Chapter 1. Many have held that the Hebrew for “day” does not necessarily mean a twenty-four hour period of time. The contention is that the Hebrew word can also mean a longer period and thus can allow for what has become known as the day-age theory. It was this theory that had the strongest influence in my own original acceptance of “Theistic Evolution”.
I began changing my mind as I became acquainted with the Hebrew Language. One of the first things I learned when taking Hebrew is that its words have “pools of meaning” which require “context” to determine the exact meaning in a particular sentence, thus context is extremely important.
Those of us who speak English have a difficult time accepting the extreme importance of using context to fully understand meaning. Too many times in our own language, the “rules of grammar” are broken with no difficulty to the understanding of a text. I’m sure many of us remember the little saying, “ ‘I’ before ‘E’ except after ‘C’ and when it is used as in ‘neighbor’ and ‘weigh’”. Here in this saying is the demonstration of the “English problem” of which I am speaking. The rule is not hard and fast, there are times when breaking the rule is appropriate; one is in error if he does not break the rule.
This concept of “breaking the rule of grammar” does not exist in the Hebrew language. The Hebrew word “Yadah” (hdy))) is one such word that demonstrates this point. The issue stems from its various conjugations. Conjugations are various meanings that are connected to a word as a result of its spelling and the context. In English we basically have three conjugations: past, present, and future. These conjugations never change the main idea of the word, but just tell when the action occurred (example: I can say, “I am running now” – present: “I will run tomorrow” – future: and “I ran yesterday” – past). The Hebrew system is altogether different. It requires English speakers to think in terms unfamiliar to us. First, there are seven conjugations, not three. Hebrew conjugations do not deal with time (that is determined by the context), but rather they deal more with the meaning of the action. For this reason, sometimes when a word changes conjugations, it substantially changes the meaning of the word as well.
“Yadah” (hdy))) is a good example demonstrating that Hebrew grammar rules must be followed; and that context is vital to meaning. “Yadah” (hdy))) can mean a variety of things depending on which conjugation (or form) it is found. In the “Qal” form it means “to shoot –as with an arrow”. In “Piel” form it means “to throw down”. In the “Hiphil” form it means “to give thanks”, and in the “Hithpael” form it means “to confess”. Now, let’s suppose you want to communicate to someone that you went hunting and shot a deer. In Hebrew, it would be very important to use the word in the “Qal” form. If you said it in the “Hiphil” form, you would end up saying you went hunting and gave thanks to the deer. In the “Hithpael” form, you would have said that you went hunting and ended up confessing to the deer.
With this understanding, that Hebrew words may have different meanings depending on conjugation and context, we must ask ourselves several questions about Genesis 1 and the creation story. How are we to understand the meaning of the word “day”?. Is it a literal 24-hour period or is it something different? It is often said that the word used in Genesis for “day” can also mean “period of time”. This is true. In certain contexts, it does mean “period of time”. In other contexts, it means twenty four (24) hours. Understanding the extreme importance of “context” in the translation of Hebrew, our question must become, “What does the context of the passage dictate the word to mean?”
If the Bible is truly the Word of God, and if God is always the same and never changes, then what Moses understood God wanted him to write in Genesis chapter 1 is precisely the same way he meant it to read and to be understood in the twenty-first century. Just because a word has various meanings in various contexts, does not give us the liberty to choose which meaning should be used without connecting it to linguistic usage.
Even though there are times in the English language when we can twist the rules, we generally abide by the rules to make our communication with others understandable. We use “keys” within the context to determine meaning. In many respects, the Hebrew word for “day” is very similar to the English word for “day”. Suppose I am speaking with someone who has just taken a new job; if I were to ask them, “How was your first day?”.
They would undoubtedly begin to tell me of their first twenty-four period on the job. Why? Because of clues within the context. Those include the fact that in English we have no other word to refer to a twenty-four hour period of time, so we take it to mean twenty-four hours. Plus, I had asked about a specific “day” - the first one. These context clues lead the responder to answer as if I referred to a twenty-four hour period of time; and he would be right.
Again, using contextual clues, the English word “day” does not always mean a twenty-four hour period of time. Suppose we were talking about society in general and the way people in society respond to certain events and I asked, “What were things like in your Grandfather’s day?” The contextual evidence is there to indicate that I did not intend to refer to a twenty-four hour period of time. The context shows that we were discussing time periods in general so the word “day” is taken to mean periods of time in general. This same logic also applies in Hebrew.
The word used throughout Genesis for “day” is the word “Yom” ( mwy)) ). It is the only word in the Hebrew language to refer to a twenty-four period of time. But, as we have already observed; the word, in appropriate contexts, does mean “a period of time”. In Genesis 4: 3, Moses says: “And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord.” The phrase “in the process of time” is the translation of the word “Yom” ( mwy)) ). It is translated the way it is because the context clues point to the fact that the passage is referring more to a period in Cain’s life, than to a specific point in time.
The next question we must ask is: “What are the contextual clues that make us conclude that the word “Yom” ( mwy)) ) in Genesis chapter 1 means twenty-four hour periods of time?” The first clue is that according to Hebrew usage, the word “Yom” ( mwy)) ) always refers to a twenty-four (24) hour period of time when connected with a number. There is no stronger way to refer to 24 hours than this in the Hebrew language. Since the references using “Yom” in Genesis 1 are all connected with a number (example: Gen 1:5 “…So the evening and the morning were the first day.”); it must only refer to a twenty- four hour period of time. It would break every rule of the Hebrew language to allow it to be anything else.
There is one last contextual clue. Each time the word appears in Genesis 1, it is also connected to the phrase; “..it was evening and it was morning…”. When do you have “evenings and mornings”? They are connected to twenty-four hour periods of time. Thus, using contextual clues and staying within Hebrew rules of grammar; we must conclude that Moses was describing God as making the world in seven twenty-four hour periods of time.
There is yet another question regarding creation and its time frame which needs to be answered. Are there other words that Moses could have used if the meaning was to be understood as longer periods of time? Yes, there are several words in the Hebrew language which Moses could have used if it was God’s intent to tell us that creation took several long periods of time.
“Dowr” (rwd) could have been used. This word is used in Job 8: 8. In this passage of scripture, there is a conversation between Job and one of his friends. His friend is asking Job to look back in history to see how things were. He says, “For inquire, please, of the former age, and consider the things discovered by their fathers…”. The word translated ‘age’ in the phrase “former age” is the word “Dowr” (rwd). It means “period of time”. It is most interesting that the rest of the phrase uses the word “former”. That Hebrew word means “first” or “that which happened before something else”. Here we have a Hebrew word connected with the concept of numerical value which still means “period of time”. If God intended to say that it took several long periods of time to create the world, why did He break all the rules of Hebrew grammar and use “Yom” when He had at His disposal the word “Dowr”?
“Zeman” (nmz) found in Ecclesiastes 3:1 could have been used. “Zeman” means “an appointed time” or “season-such as season of a year”. In our world, there are at least four seasons. If it was God’s intent to let us know that it took several longer periods of time to create the world, could He not have identified seven “seasons” instead of seven “days”? Again, why did God need to break the rules of grammar and use “Yom” instead of staying within grammar, and using a word such as “Zemam”?
“ ‘Eth” (t[) is yet another word that could have been used in Genesis 1. It is used over and over again in Ecclesiastes chapter 3. It is translated “time”, and has the basic meaning of “an event” or “occurrence”. It has the idea that a block-of-time has been set aside for something to happen. I must ask: Why did God need to break the rules of grammar and use “Yom” (one day), instead of staying within grammar and using a word such as “ ‘eth”?
There is one final Hebrew word to which I would like to draw your attention, “Mow’ed” (d[wm). This word is used by Moses in Exodus 9: 5. The text says, “Then the Lord appointed a set-time, saying, ‘Tomorrow the Lord will do this thing in the land’.”
“Mo’ed” (d[wm) is translated as “an appointment”, “meeting time” , or a time set aside for something to happen. If God would have wanted us to know that it took a period of time to make the earth, could He not have said, “There was a time set aside for the development of the plants”, or “A time set aside for the creation of the animals”? Instead God chose to say, “So the evening and the morning were the third day”, “the evening and the morning were the fifth day”, “the evening and the morning were the sixth day” .
I am not trying to make a complete list of all the words in the Hebrew language which mean longer periods of time. I am trying to show that there were common Hebrew words available to Moses which would have adequately expressed the idea of blocks of time. Instead he used the word “Yom”, a word that most strongly defines a twenty-four hour period of time.
There are many who uphold the belief that God has a definite integrity problem if He did not mean a “longer period of time”. This is coming from the assumption that science has obviously proved creation took “long periods of time” to develop. Therefore, since we know, through science, that creation took a long time, God is being “deceitful” when using the term “Yom” to mean twenty-four hour days.
In reality, I think God has a much larger integrity problem if He did not create the world in seven twenty-four days. The Scriptures tell us that one of God’s primary attributes is that He will not lie, nor is He deceitful.
Numbers chapter 23 verse 19 says this:
“God is not a man, that He should lie
Nor the son of man, that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do it?
Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?”
I Samuel 15: 29 echoes this same thought when it says:
“And also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor relent. For He is not a man that He should relent.”
Titus 1:2 makes the point very clear:
“..in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began”
The scripture also states in I Corinthians 14: 33 that God is not the author of confusion:
“For God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints.”
As can be seen from the Biblical descriptions of God, He is not the author of lies and confusion. He is to be believed from His first word to His last word. Any confusion comes from our unbelief.
The above information brought me to the conclusion that the Bible teaches a literal, actual creation period of seven twenty-four hour days. We may wish it to be different, but this is what the Bible teaches. There is no other intellectually honest way to approach it. This, however, leads me to another very big question:….. “What do I do with all the scientific information that seems to tell a different story?”
A thought occurred to me while I was reading Genesis 3:17, 18 and 19:
(This is God speaking to Adam)
“Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of
which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: Cursed is the ground
for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and
thistles it shall bring forth for you. And you shall eat the herb of the field. In the
sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it
you were taken for dust you are and to dust you shall return.”
God was changing the second law of thermodynamics. The second law of thermodynamics basically says that all things move from order to disorder and from life to death. However, the way Genesis chapter three reads, the law of thermodynamics did not function before Adam’s fall the way it does now.
There are at least three things that are stated as changes:
1. Some types of plants will grow where you did not plant them (specifically
named are thorns and thistles).
2. You will have to work hard to eat (vs 17 “in toil you shall eat”
and vs 19 “in the sweat of your face you shall eat”).
3. Death will now occur (vs 19 “for dust you are and to dust you shall return”).
There would have been no reason to present these statements if there was not a “change being made. This says to me that before Genesis chapter three happened, plants only grew where you planted them, work was fun, and there was no such thing as death.
As I thought about this it slowly began to dawn on me that God not only created the world; but He also created the natural laws that make it function. If this is true, then it is also true that the dynamics used to create the world are not to be seen in the functioning of the present-day world. If God is infinite in wisdom, infinite in knowledge, and infinite in power, how is it that we somehow conclude that the only way God could create the world is to use natural laws as we know them? A God who has the power, wisdom and knowledge to create the natural laws that allow this planet to function, would also possess the power, wisdom and knowledge to develop and use other laws that we have no concept of to create the world.
Let me explain. Looking at the mineral deposits in the earth, we find coal, diamonds and many other minerals and metals. For our example, let us look at coal. Coal is created by decaying plant life that is put under pressure for long periods of time. Thus, when we find coal, we assume that the world must be old enough to allow this deposit to develop. That development includes a period of time to allow the vegetation to grow, a period of time to allow the vegetation to die and develop into a peat bog, and then be buried and pressurized… all happening naturally.
If the world was totally developed by natural law, this is the only way it could have happened. However, the Bible indicates that the world’s age is only in the thousands of years, not in the millions. Is this not a contradiction?
One answer is that the Bible could be wrong. It could be that it took millions of years to develop the earth through natural law. If this is correct, then it would be logical to ignore the Bible because it does not express truth.
Let me suggest another answer: These formations were not developed by natural law. The laws that were used to develop the coal deposits are not known to us. There is a being in the universe who has more power, wisdom, and knowledge than we can ever imagine; He used powers which we know nothing about, to create the world. If you have power to create live plants, wouldn’t you also have the power to create dead plants? If you have the power to create dead plants, would you not also be able to create peat bogs that contain dead plants? If you can create peat bogs, would you not be able to create the pressure needed to create the coal? And if you have all that power, what stops you from just skipping all the intermediate steps, and create coal in the first place? Would this newly created coal contain evidence of having decayed plant life in it? Of course it would, because that is what coal is. Does this mean that the creator deceived you? No, it just means that God has information and abilities which far surpass us.
Does this mean that you cannot make coal with natural law? Of course not, coal can be made with natural law, if given time to do it. But, if you only have a day or so, you will need to use powers unknown to humans. This is man’s biggest mistake. We have assumed that we have all the knowledge and have access to all the power necessary to do anything and everything. We do not. God’s ways of doing things (including creation) are far above ours.
In Genesis 1: 28 I believe God lays out, in simple form, the mission of man:
“Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill
the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of
the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Here is what I believe God is saying in that mission statement.
“I have created a very beautiful and engaging planet for you to live on and
explore. I have also designed it with many surprises and secrets hidden within it.
It is your job, O man, to seek out the surprises and discover the secrets I have
placed there for you. Once you have found them, it will then be your job to figure
out how to use these things to make the planet more engaging and beautiful than it
was when I gave it to you. I’m not going to tell you what they are, I have given
you a brain – go figure it out.”
Humans have done a pretty good job of following God’s mission for us. Through many years of learning, we’ve discovered all sorts of natural laws and found all kinds of minerals and ores. We’ve learned how to take these things to create music, and monuments. We’ve used these things to learn how to communicate very quickly with each other all over the planet. We’ve learned how to move over the surface and through the water and air.
In man’s quest for our own universal knowledge, we have created a personal problem.
I believe that our big problem is arrogance and pride, and maybe some fear. It is extremely difficult for man to believe in a power and creator greater than himself. If there is a God who can create a mountain just by speaking (as Genesis suggests He did), then what does that mean, if I should ever encounter Him?
We humans have spent far too much time trying to discover how we got here apart from God, when God’s plan for us was that we should accept His revelation to us. Instead, we say “I will believe God on the points that I agree with Him. If I disagree, then I will seek another answer.” Let me suggest instead that we should spend our time reveling in what He has made for us, and continue our search for other secrets and surprises yet hidden within this world awaiting our exploration and discovery.
Does this mean the concept of evolution is fraudulent? I guess that depends on what is meant by fraudulent. If you mean one can show, on paper, that it is possible to create the world by evolutionary processes, my answer is that I think it is possible to show that, at least in part, the world could be built that way. But, if you ask me do I believe that evolution is the method actually used to create the world, then I would tell you, “No, I do not think evolution was the method God used to create all things.” The Bible tells us very plainly that God created the world in seven twenty-four days. Evolution would take too long.
It makes me chuckle when I hear people from either side of the argument speak as though there can only be one way to produce a creative act. Our world is full of illustrations where there are multiple of ways to get to the same end. Business is always talking of thinking “outside the box”. By that they mean they want to find a new and better way to make the same product, or to ship something quicker and easier. In other words business men are very aware that there could be more than one way to do the job and the same is true with the creation of the world. Just because one may be able to show that the earth can be created by the evolutionary process, does not mean that God used that method to do it. God was thinking “outside the box” when He created the world. I would not even be surprised if we discovered several other possibilities for how the world was created. It really does not matter, because the system God used only took seven days. So, if you come up with a way to create the world that takes longer than seven days, then you haven’t found the system God used, even if your way works.
Let me illustrate my point this way. I like to work with my hands and build things. Now, if you were to ask me if I could cut for you 100 steel bars one foot long, you might hear me say, “Sure, but it may take me a month or so because all I have is a hack saw”. If you were to go to the manufacturing facility where I worked years ago and ask them the same question, their answer would be quite different than mine. You would probably hear them say something like, “Sure, would you like to wait while we do that for you?” What makes the difference is applied technology, not the final result.
You see, my hack saw has a certain amount of technology to it. It is made of high grade steel with sharp points fabricated into one edge. These sharp points will dig into other types of metal products, and when pushed, will cause a chip to fall out. When this process is kept up long enough by me pushing the saw blade back and forth over the metal, the metal will eventually get cut.
The manufacturing company, however, uses a much superior technology. Their saw blades are made with silicone carbide. Saw blades made with silicone carbide can take a bigger chip out of metal at a faster speed and can have more pressure applied to it during the process. This process allows an even bigger chip to be removed at one time. They have electric motors that can create greater speed, and hydraulic and air cylinders and electric circuits that can create more pressure and provide automatic feed systems. The technology developed through electricity, air and hydraulics makes it possible for the manufacturing company to do things multiple times faster, and more accurately, than I can do with my hand held hack saw.
Why can God create the world in seven days when we can only come up with a technique that takes several billion years? Simple, God has a vastly superior technology at His disposal. Listen to God Himself.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the
LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than
your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8 & 9
So, if you ask, “Do I believe in evolution?” my answer is this: There are some things in our world that can be accounted for by a process we call “evolution”, but it comes nowhere close to explaining how the world was created in seven days as the Bible so emphatically explains. We have a bit more work to do to figure out that technology.