The Creation Story God should have written

Einstein on the Bible

What did Albert Einstein think about the Bible? Well, here's what he said a year before he died.

The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.

The Bible and the Quran agree: Insects have four legs

In a previous post, I mentioned that the Bible and the Quran agree on the worth of a woman. A woman is worth about half as much as a man.

Well, here is something else they seem to agree on: insects have four legs.

Here's what the Bible says:

Even these of them ye may eat; the locust after his kind, and the bald locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind. But all other flying creeping things, which have four feet, shall be an abomination unto you. Leviticus 11:22-23

And here's the Quran:

Allah hath created every animal of water. Of them is (a kind) that goeth upon its belly and (a kind) that goeth upon two legs and (a kind) that goeth upon four. Quran 24:45

It's true that neither holy book comes right out and says that all insects have four legs.

But the Bible says that locusts, beetles, and grasshoppers (which are the ones you are allowed to eat) have four legs, while "all other flying creeping things, which have four feet, shall be an abomination unto you." So that would seem to include insects in God's "four legged, flying, creeping things" taxon.

The Quran is a bit less clear, but it too seems to imply that insects have either zero, two or (more likely) four legs.

Isn't it nice that the Bible and Quran agree on something?

BC (Biblically Correct) Tours

Sometimes it's hard to be biblically correct. But these folks try really hard.

Here are some fun quotes.

Narrator: They say Adam and Eve walked with dinosaurs. And there was no such thing as death, not even meat eating animals, until Eve ate fruit from the tree of knowledge. So, for instance, they say that Tyranosaurus rex with those enormous, ripping teeth was designed to eat vegetables.

BC tour guide (pointing at a T. rex): If this creature was designed to eat meat from the very start, what would he have to do until Adam and Eve sinned and death entered the world?

(Tour Guide answers since none of the kids knew the BC answer): Fast and pray until the fall.

Tour Guide: Is that likely?

Tour Guide (not waiting for a response): The answer is, everyone look at me and say, "no".

Tour guide (since the kids didn't respond satisfactorily): Try that with me: "No".

The kids looked confused by all that. I don't blame them.

But they were no more confused than the BC tour guides.

Narrator: Their time line for their 6000 year history is a little hazy.

BC tour guide: For the flood there was a period there where we believe people lived to be 800, 900 years old, almost 1000 years old.

Narrator: So how long was that? How many generations of 800 year old people did we have?

BC tour guide: Without doing the math, I think there's about 6 or 7 generations.

Narrator: In doing the math that would take about 5600 years during which people lived roughly 800 years.

BC tour guide: So from Adam to Noah, I think it's about 1000 years. I could be wrong about that.

The biblically correct answer is 1656 years. (The ABC folks forgot to figure in when the old guys did all that begatting.)

BC tour guide: Is evolution a religion?

Everyone (more or less) answers together: Yes

BC tour guide (pointing to some fossils): What do you see right here?

BC tour guide (not waiting for a response): You're looking at God's judgment of a sinful world. You're looking at the remains of the flood.

Narrator: Why are human and dinosaur remains not found in the same sedimentary layers?

BC tour guide: Okay, there are several problems for the creationist. There's no doubt about that. And one would be that.

BC tour guide: How do we know that God made birds to be birds?

Everyone all together: It says it in the Bible.

(via Pharyngula)

Evolution Creationist Style: It all happened in 1656 years

In the beginning, God created everything good. No predators, parasites, pathogens, pain, disease, or death for any of God's creatures. Every living thing (except for maybe the plants) lived forever in a vegan paradise that was all "very good."

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. Genesis 1:30-31

But Adam screwed all that up by sinning (or whatever) and God cursed the ground causing thorns and thistles to grow (Genesis 3:17-18), creating the cruel and brutal place that we see today. It went from "very good" to "no country for old men" in just 1656 years.

How do we know this? The Bible tells us so. Here's how.

	Years after the creation of Adam
And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son ... and called his name Seth: Genesis 5:3	130
And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos. Genesis 5:6	235
And Enos lived ninety years, and begat Cainan. Genesis 5:9	325
And Cainan lived seventy years and begat Mahalaleel. Genesis 5:12	395
And Mahalaleel lived sixty and five years, and begat Jared.Genesis 5:15	460
And Jared lived an hundred sixty and two years, and he begat Enoch. Genesis 5:18	622
And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methuselah: Genesis 5:21	687
And Methuselah lived an hundred eighty and seven years, and begat Lamech. Genesis 5:25	874
And Lamech lived an hundred eighty and two years, and begat a son: Genesis 5:28	1056
And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth. Genesis 7:6	1656

Okay, so the flood happened 1656 years after the creation of Adam. But how do we know that creation had completed its transformation (evolution?) from kind and gentle to cruel and brutal by the time of the flood?

Well, again the Bible tells us so.

The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Genesis 6:11-13

The whole earth "was filled with violence" (God made it that way), so God had to kill everything on earth to make it less violent. Fair is fair.

So nature was "filled with violence" by the time of the flood. The only question is how did it get that way? Did God re-create it immediately after Adam's fall in a second "there will be blood" creation? Of did it evolve naturally without God's involvement in the 1656 years between fall and flood?

Can some Bible believer clarify this for me?

To torture little children just for the fun of it: The Hitchens-Richards ID debate

I wish I could have seen yesterday's Intelligent Design debate between Christopher Hitchens and Jay Richards at Stanford University. (If anyone can find a transcript or a webcast, please let me know.) But from the report in the Stanford Daily, it was another bad day for ID.

The first bit of evidence that Richards presented in favor of ID was the fact that we all feel "simple moral truths." As an example, he pointed to the fact that "we all know that it’s wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it."

And I agree, we pretty much all know that. Which is why we also know that life wasn't designed by a kind and loving God. Because the designer, if there is one, purposefully designed creatures that "torture little children" and he did so "just for the fun of it." Or so says Revelation 4:11, anyway.

Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

Here's what Sir David Attenborough said when asked about ID.

When people talk about God and creation, they always think of beautiful things, like roses and hummingbirds. But I also think of a little African boy sitting on a river bank in West Africa with a worm eating its way through his eyeball, which will make him blind in the next few years. Now if you are telling me that God created the rose and the hummingbird, presumably he also created this thing in his eye. And it didn't evolve the way that I believe that it did, but it was created by God. Some way or another, God said, "I will make a worm that can only live by boring through peoples' eyes." Now I don't find that compatible with the Christian idea of a God who cares for the well being of each of us.

Here is the interview with David Attenborough.

And here is a Wikipedia article on River Blindness.

In the beginning ...

God created the heaven and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)

What an opportunity for God (assuming there is a God who had something to do with the Bible) to reveal himself to us all. All that he needed to do is tell us just when the beginning was. Was it a relatively recent event (like a few thousand years ago) or is the universe immensely old (say 13.7 billion years)?

We had no idea, none at all, about the true age of the universe until the last few hundred years. All God had to do was tell us that it was really, really old -- over a million times as old as nearly everyone thought it was. That would have been some impressive evidence for the God of the Bible.

But the Bible's God is a young earth creationist. For although the Bible's begats do not provide a clear creation date (though many believers believe that they do), they do provide a range of possible dates. The universe (if you believe in the Bible) is 5500 to 7500 years old.

So right from the start we know the Bible is wrong. The universe is about 2 million times older than the Bible says that it is.

How many species did Adam name?

And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him. Genesis 2:19-20

So how many species did Adam name?

Well, if you believe the Genesis story, "every living creature" was directly and immediately created by God in that failed matchmaking attempt. God hoped that one of them (the bot fly maybe) would strike Adam's fancy, but none of them did. Shucks! So God created Eve instead.

In the process, though, Adam named all of the species that God created. And he did it in a single afternoon.

So why is it taking us so long? Thousands of biologists have been working for for nearly 350 years, yet they still haven't named them all.

About ten days ago, the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS) recorded its millionth species. But that leaves another 750,000 known species that have yet to be included. And no one knows (except maybe Adam and God) how many unknown species are still out there. Some estimates put it at as many as ten million or so (not including extinct species).

So Adam must have identified and named millions of species on that fine afternoon in the garden of Eden. 350,000 species of beetles, 120,000 flies, 100,000 parasitic wasps, 20,000 nematodes. And he was just getting started. He must have needed that nap after he was done. (I sympathize with Adam. I spent a few hours this afternoon trying to identify a half dozen aquatic invertebrates.)

But it was all part of God's plan. He was trying to find a mate for Adam and he just got carried away with beetles, flies, wasps, and worms. Stuff like that happens in the Bible.

Behold, it was very good.

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. Genesis 1:31

Everything that God made was, at least at the time and according to him, very good. But things seem to have changed since then.

This is a problem for believers (and not just bible-believers, but all theists and deists, as well). Where did all the predators, parasites, disease, death, and suffering come from? Since they exist, they must have been designed. And although the design may have been intelligent enough, it could hardly be called benevolent.

But Christians believe in a benevolent God. So what's with all the nasty stuff out there?

Well, as you might have guessed, it's all right there in the Bible. But like everything else in there, it depends on who you ask.

1. Some say that the original creation was just like God said it was in Genesis 1:31: very good. No predators, prey, suffering, death, or disease. Every living thing was immortal and would have lived happily ever after, if only Adam (who cares about Eve?) didn't sin. But he did, so God changed everything. Creatures prey upon one another in a painful struggle ending in a pointless death.

2. Others say that death and suffering are all a part of God's grand design. Nature is red in tooth and claw because God likes it that way.

   [W]e like to think of God as being the God of love. However, God's character is multifaceted and complex. The God of love is going to throw plagues against the earth, eventually burn it up in judgment, and ultimately sentence the unrepentant to eternal torment. Animal death is certainly no less loving than these things.

   The God of love tortures people forever in hell; he also enjoys watching cats play with mice.

3. Others say that God's creation was perfectly benevolent, but then Satan snuck in and ruined everything. They quote Matthew 13:28 where the servant asks the master where the weeds came from and he replies, "An enemy has done this." Satan has power to change God's creation, and he has done so with a vengeance. There is a war going on within nature and God is just another enemy combatant.

4. Others say that in the beginning God started it all in a big bang billions of years ago, but he didn't know where it was going and didn't intervene along the way (except for maybe a tweak now and then when nobody was looking). He's as surprised (if he still exists) and as shocked by what he sees as you are.

5. And others just pretend that nature is kind and ignore it when it appears otherwise. Just like they do with the Bible.

I'd be interested to know what the believers think about these options. Which do you prefer? And did I miss any?