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Young Earth creationism

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Young Earth creationism is the belief that the Earth and life on Earth were created by a direct action of God a relatively short time ago, that the book of Genesis is a historically accurate account of those events. It is generally held by those Christians, Jews, and Muslims who also believe that the ancient Hebrew text of Genesis is an accurate historical account. It is often associated with certain kinds of Creation science, which holds that some of the events associated with supernatural creation can be evidenced and modelled through the scientific method.

Young Earth Creationists (YEC) comprise mainly Orthodox Jews and Christians who interpret the creation account of Genesis as literally historically accurate, and in most cases, inerrant. There are also Muslim YECs who regard the Qur'an in the same way.

The defining characteristic of Young Earth Creationism is their belief that the Earth is "young", on the order of 6,000 to 10,000 years old, rather than the age of 4.5 billion years as determined by a variety of methods including radiometric dating. This figure is arrived at using the ages given in the genealogies and other dates in the Bible, similar to the process used by Archbishop James Ussher when he dated creation at 4004 BC.

Young Earth Creationism is normally regarded as opposing the scientific theory of evolution. YECs are also fundamentally opposed to any explanation for the origins of anything which replaces God as the universal creator as reported in the Bible, whether it be the origins of biological diversity, the origins of life or the origins of the universe itself. This has led some YECs to criticise intelligent design, a hypothesis which is seen by anti-creationists as an alternative form of creationism but which generally accepts an ancient origin for the Earth and a comparatively minimal role for an unnamed designer (not necessarily even God).[1]

Young Earth creationists challenge the dominant principles of philosophical naturalism and uniformitarianism in the mainstream scientific community, and assert instead that the physical evidence today best supports the creationist viewpoint. See Creation vs. evolution debate for a more complete discussion.

Young Earth Creationism is considered easily falsified and not scientifically productive by the large majority of scientists, who assert that Young Earth Creationism and similar hypotheses are at odds with many direct and indirect observations.

Young Earth creationists acknowledge that they base their ideas in part on assumptions of a supernatural creator, but claim that modern evolutionary biology is at odds with select many observations, and where it isn't at odds is largely unfalsifiable and is based on unprovable naturalistic assumptions. In support of this last statement they often quote some evolutionary scientists acknowledging a philosophical basis for their belief in evolution. [2] [3]

Young Earth Creationist ideas

Young Earth Creationists state that their position is based upon a plain reading of the Bible. For them, the Bible is the central organizing text of their lives. It is the source of how they understand the world, man's place in the world, and his purpose for life. As Henry Morris, a leading young earth creationist, explains it, Christians who flirt with less-than-literal readings of biblical texts are also flirting with theological disaster. Allegorical readings of Creation, the Fall, the Flood and the Tower of Babel undermine core Christian doctrines like the birth and resurrection of Jesus Christ. According to Morris, Christians must "either ... believe God's Word all the way, or not at all." Therefore, Young earth creationists take the account of Genesis to be a historical account of the origin of the Earth and life.

Genesis reports that God created the Earth in six days, and rested on the seventh. After creating the Earth and all the animals and plants, God created a garden which was inhabited by Adam and Eve. As a result of the Fall of Man, humanity was forced to work hard to provide food, childbirth became painful, and physical death entered the world.

The Genealogies of Genesis record the line of descent from Adam to Noah to Abraham, with the ages at which they had the next in line and the ages at which they died. According to the account, God sent a global flood 1656 years after Adam. Young Earth creationists assert that the flood was a combination of radical geological activity (the fountains of the great deep opening) and extreme rain. They claim that the land before the flood was much more level, but that extreme geological action during the flood raised mountains to new heights and dropped the sea-bed, so that the water that had covered the land flowed into the sea. Young Earth creationists sometimes refer to a concept called "Flood geology" to argue that the vast majority of geological features are the result of the flood.

From that point, the account indicates that lifespans dropped quickly from an average of 900 years at the time of Noah to an average of 100 by the time of Abraham. Young Earth creationists have suggested that this is due to the effects of the inbreeding that took place after the flood, as only eight people remained. Creationists also assert that all the contemporary species of animals are descended from those original animals on the ark; that the animals adapted to their environments by the process of variation and natural selection. Contrary to the theory of evolution, however, Young Earth Creationists assert that the process of variation and natural selection resulted in a loss of genetic information.

Subsequent genealogies in the text identify individuals named Egypt, Gomer, Sheba, Canaan, and Sidon, who are believed to have founded the cities and civilizations that were later to bear their names.

Young Earth Creationism as against other forms of creationism

Young Earth Creationists generally hold that the plain meaning of the text indicates literal days, and cannot reasonably be interpreted otherwise. They argue that while the Hebrew word for "day" (yôm) can mean long age or unspecified time, this is only in special cases with a preposition. However, in the specific context of Genesis 1, the days are numbered and have "evening and morning", so can mean only literal days, and this is the only way that makes sense of the Sabbath command in Exodus 20:8–11. That is, young-earth creationists argue that it is a glaring exegetical fallacy to take a meaning from one context and apply it to a completely different one.

Further, Young Earth Creationists argue that their position is the only way to explain the Fall, which introduced death and suffering into the world. They argue that all long-age views entail death before sin, which they regard as a severe theological error, violating Genesis 3, Romans 5:12–19, 8:17–22 and 1 Corinthians 15:21–22.

Young Earth Creationism and the Omphalos hypothesis

Young Earth creationists usually distinguish their own hypotheses from the Omphalos hypothesis put forth by the science writer Philip Henry Gosse (omphalos is Greek for navel). Gosse's hypothesis claims that, just as Adam had a navel, evidence of a gestation he never experienced, so also the Earth was created ex nihilo complete with evidence of a prehistoric past that never actually occurred. Gosse's hypothesis allows for a young earth without giving rise to any predictions that would contradict scientific findings.

However, most YECs today argue that Adam did not have a navel [4]. Also, most YECs, in contrast with Gosse, attempt to re-interpret scientific data to support their hypothesis that the earth is in fact young.

Criticism of Young Earth Creationism by proponents of mainstream science

Proponents of mainstream science state that every challenge to evolution by creationists is interpreted in an unscientific fashion or is readily explainable by mainstream science. The few "gaps" that they recognise as remaining in the mainstream scientific theory are often pointed to by creationists as being insurmountable flaws with evolution, while those working in the field who pointed out the "gaps" in the first place rarely view the situation in such a fashion. On the whole, they add, the Young Earth They also claim that creation advocates do not critique their own ideas with the same level of incredulity. However, the anti-creationist Jim Lippard said:

At times, the creationists criticize other creationists more strongly and more accurately than their opponents do. Letter in the Skeptical Inquirer 18(2):220, Winter 1994

Proponents of mainstream science claim that most creationists readily quote evolutionists acknowledging the philosophical assumptions involved in the scientific pursuit, but are sometimes evasive about their own assumptions. Notable exception are organizations such as the Institute for Creation Research and Answers in Genesis..

See also

Organisations and web-sites

Articles

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