Lesson summary “Journey through the days of God’s Creations”

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The story of the creation of the world in the Bible is known to almost every person, even those who do not particularly believe in the Lord. The depth of such knowledge lies solely in the power of faith and the study of the details of the sacred scriptures. Some of the information is passed on to us from generation to generation. For example, we all know that on the last day of the week it is necessary to drop everything and rest.

The Mystery of the Days of Creation

According to the book of Genesis, God created our world in six days. On the one hand, this is a matter of faith, and Christians believe that nothing is impossible for God. On the other hand, what then to do with the data of science and the statements of scientists that our universe arose about 14 billion years ago, and planet Earth four and a half billion years ago?

The Book of Genesis was written in the 13th century BC. It would seem, what to expect from ancient humanity in terms of scientific discoveries, if much later a number of Christian theologians seriously interpreted the six days of creation in a literal sense, and Galileo Galilei in the 17th century after the Nativity of Christ was subjected to trial by the Catholic Inquisition for his idea of ​​the rotation of the Earth around the Sun ?

However, in an equally ancient book of the Old Testament - the book of Job 26:7 - we find a phrase that is quite consistent with modern science, but perplexed interpreters of the 4th century and even later centuries: “hanged the earth on nothing.” Second Maccabees 7:28 states, “God created everything out of nothing.”

Having studied all the places in the Bible about the creation of the world, Blessed Augustine of Hippo in the 4th century suggested: Not only in the first three days, before the appearance of the luminaries, but also in the remaining three, the name of day refers to the species of things being created. Saint Basil the Great, around the same time, puts forward the hypothesis that the seventh day of creation - the time when the Lord rested from work - continues now and should be replaced by the eighth day of Judgment and the advent of the Kingdom of God: So, let's say that now is the seventh day before that eighth day retribution (for the sins) of this age.

Whether you call it a day, or a century, you express the same concept, whether you say that it is a day, or that it is a state, it is always one, and not many; whether you call it a century, it will be single, and not multiple. Therefore, Moses, in order to raise his thought to the future life, called this image of the age one, this firstfruits of days, this modern day, the holy day of the Lord, glorified by the resurrection of the Lord. That’s why he says: “there was evening, and there was morning, one day,” we find in him.

It is interesting that the mention of certain “days” in the book of Genesis is given long before the story of the creation of the Earth itself, therefore, the alternation of earthly days. In addition, scientists say that initially the earth’s day was only 15 modern hours, and in each era it was a completely different time period.

It is also strange that the biblical day begins in the evening. This is exactly how the ancient Jews counted their time, but, who knows, perhaps the meticulous performers of the letter of Scripture borrowed this custom from the book of Genesis... If we resort to linguistic analysis, then the biblical word “evening” 'erev is the same root word “mixing”, “ morning" boqer - the word "order", and "day" jom also means "time". Perhaps we are simply dealing with an inaccurate translation from some more ancient language related to Hebrew. It seems that the “days of creation” in the book of Genesis are divided not only by the creation of something fundamentally new in the universe, but also by the establishment of some kind of internal order instead of the chaos reigning at the dawn of creation...

And even though the same book of Job also speaks of pillars supporting the vault of heaven, and in the psalms - of the foundation of the earth on the waters (Ps. 136:6), those who expect nothing from ancient humanity will be completely satisfied with this, those who whoever wants to see Divine revelation in the Bible will certainly try to consider each of its words not only in its literal meaning, but also to reveal the hidden meanings of what was said. And if we recall the “ether” and “seeds of the universe” (the doctrine of molecules) of the ancient Greeks, then the firmament of heaven (in the Hebrew original “vault”) and the waters on which the earth rests are definitely worth interpreting. After all, scientists and thinkers are forced to use the language that is available in their era to convey their ideas.

see also

• Creation
• Origin of the Universe
• Origin of life

Creation of the world and the Big Bang theory

If we accept that the firmament and the waters are an ancient attempt to designate the sphere, space or proto-matter from which the world is created, then in general the narrative of the book of Genesis looks very similar to what science offers us today. The order of creation of the world, with the exception of the sun and stars, also does not come into any conflict with science. According to the Big Bang theory, light initially existed only in a scattered form, and only then began to gather into formed beams.

Interpreters of biblical texts point to the repetition of the story of the creation of “heaven” and “earth” on different days of creation. They believe that on the first day we are talking about the creation of the spiritual (angelic) world - scientists would call it a parallel universe, the fourth dimension or something else - and the physical world. In the second “epoch” of creation, the Earth—our planet—and the sky as a sphere (“firmament, vault”) above it appear.

After the creation of the first forms of life - the plant world - the appearance of luminaries in the “firmament of heaven” is mentioned. If you imagine the process of the formation of the Earth, then there is nothing strange here: most likely, for a long time the light reached its surface only in a scattered form; the sun, moon and stars were not visible. Active mountain building, lava coming to the surface of an uncooled planet, a large accumulation of smoke and water vapor...

The greenhouse shell was needed at that time to protect the Earth from intense cosmic radiation until the formation of the ozone layer, as well as for the active development of plants, without which there would not have been a sufficient amount of oxygen on our planet. Confirmation of the greenhouse effect is the remains of giant plants in the layers of the most ancient rocks. Indirect confirmation is in the second chapter of the book of Genesis: “(...) every bush of the field that was not yet on the earth, and every grass of the field that was not yet growing, for the Lord God did not send rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the land , but steam rose from the earth and watered the whole face of the earth” (Genesis 2:4-6).

Obviously, there was a period in the history of the Earth when water did not collect in air masses and did not rain, but existed in the atmosphere in the form of a high concentration of water vapor, like fog. The reason for this, in addition to tectonic processes, could be the high temperature of the lower layers of the atmosphere and a large amount of carbon dioxide.

Materials for the formation of the Universe

Our entire universe consists of elementary particles. Planets, stars, you and me - everything. They were something like bricks for building the Universe, and today they still continue to build it.

• Neutrino.
  It is believed that neutrinos were among the first particles to appear in the world. They have no charge and are practically not burdened with mass, which is why they are called the lightest. These particles weigh so little that their mass is always neglected.
• Neutron.
  This is the heaviest particle as opposed to the neutrino. It also has no charge. According to its characteristics, a neutron is very similar to a proton and can even transform into it.
• Proton.
  It has a positive charge and is found in large quantities in solar radiation. It consists almost entirely of these particles.
• Electron.
  Second in mass after neutrinos. Negative charge. The first particle discovered by man.
• Photon.
  Constantly in motion at the speed of light, he is its carrier.

Formation of the Universe
Electrons, protons and neutrons gather into atoms

.
The name of the particle means “indivisible”, since previously it was believed that nothing could be smaller than it. Among other things, there are fundamental particles: quarks
,
leptons
and
bosons
.

Biblical...evolution

Proponents of evolutionary theory base their hypotheses on geological data. According to them, in the most ancient layers of rocks, only the simplest are found, a little later - plants, then fish, lizards, even later - birds, then all of them, plus mammals, new species of reptiles. The person appears later than everyone else. On this basis, evolutionists say that one type of animal has “outgrown” or turned into another, that is, about evolution. This is just a theory that encounters many opponents in the secular scientific world. Facts are just what she relies on. And they correspond exactly to the book of Genesis.

Evolution means "development". The creation of the world, described in the Holy Scriptures, can indeed be represented as a kind of gradual development of life forms. God does not create each fish and bird separately. The text of the book of Genesis says: “let the water bring forth them” about fish, reptiles and... birds, and “let the earth bring forth living creatures” - about cattle (ungulates), reptiles and beasts. They all appear in two different eras of creation - the fifth and sixth. Plants are created much earlier: on the third day of creation. They, too, were “produced by the earth.”

Species evolve and become more numerous at the same time as fish, birds and mammals appear. Perhaps today, slowly and imperceptibly for us, this process of the emergence of new life forms also continues... Any biologist will tell you that the first animal life forms initially originated in water. However, none of them will be able to explain how they got there...

A separate issue is the death of living beings, the remains of which are found en masse by geologists in various rocks, in their opinion, long before the appearance of man. The Bible does not answer this question. For me personally, it remained unresolved. Should we not assume that geologists are mistaken and that our Earth is not 4.5 billion years old? Although in the “boring billion,” when, according to scientists, nothing happened at all, I might have doubts.

Details

All three persons (hypostases) of the Holy Trinity participated in the events of the first chapter of Genesis: God the Father, God the Word (Christ) and God the Holy Spirit - the Hebrew word Elohim (אלהים) has a plural form, and the New Testament in several places testifies to the participation of Jesus in the Creation Christ as the Word not yet incarnate (John 1:3). Christian apologists of the first millennium unanimously repeat that “creation is not the same as birth.” For example, John of Damascus contrasts the creation of the universe with the birth of God the Son: “Since birth is a natural action and comes from the very essence of God, it must be beginningless and eternal, otherwise birth would cause change, there would be a God “before” and a God “after” birth . God would multiply"

[1].

All people descended from two specific people - Adam and Eve, and man has no other ancestors. Before Adam and Eve, there were no other human races on Earth.

Where did the dinosaurs go?

Twice within just a few adjacent lines of Genesis the creation of reptiles is mentioned. Each time a different word is used for them. The first time it is šereç from a word meaning “to move.” A word still used in modern Hebrew for reptiles, which apparently originated as an onomatopoeia for the sound they make when they hiss or crawl. These sheretz are produced by water. In the book of Genesis, their creation is described by a verse that is striking in sound, the beauty of which is lost in translation: “jišreśu hammajim šereç nefeš hajja” (“yishretsu hamayim sherets nefesh haya”). It perfectly conveys the infestation of reptiles or insects. By the way, nothing is said about the creation of the latter. Or it’s... Sherets.

The second time these are really “reptiles” - remes from ramas “to creep, crawl”, which the earth produces. In addition to reptiles themselves, biologists also know amphibians and ancient extinct reptiles - dinosaurs, which, they believe, gave rise not only to modern reptiles, but also to birds and mammals. All of them are also suitable for the role of the second reptiles mentioned.

Let's fast forward to the creation of man. The Lord subordinates the previously created animals to the newly created being, listing them: And have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth (Gen. 1:28). “Cattle and beasts” are not mentioned here, and of the two species of reptiles, only remes are indicated...

Let's now see what animals Noah brings into his ark. “Bring also into the ark two of every living creature, and of every flesh, so that they may remain alive with you; let them be male and female. Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the livestock according to their kinds, and of every creeping thing that creeps on the earth according to its kind, two of every kind will come to you, so that you may live” (Genesis 5:19-20). In the original there are also remes.

Unfortunately, the Bible does not reveal to us the secrets of dinosaurs, nor does it answer the question of whether there are aliens or any forms of life on other planets. This is understandable: after all, it is primarily devoted to spiritual issues. This is a book about the history of the relationship between man and God, and not about dinosaurs... Or perhaps there is simply nothing to discover there: after all, the mysterious and amazing monsters leviathan and hippopotamus in the books of Job and Isaiah, the mysterious dragon in the book of the prophet Daniel are mentioned simply as one of the animals. And in general, are you 100% sure that they are extinct?

Differences between the teachings of the Bible and evolutionist ideas