Does the Bible teach the young Earth?

[McCulloch]

Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the Universe is 6,000 years old. That calculation comes from one James Ussher, an Irish archbishop of the 17th century, who was neither a saint, a prophet, nor a scientist.. It has been, shall we say, disputed.

My point is only this; even if one takes the Bible as the literal Word of God that does not require one to believe in a young Earth. That is an extraBiblical doctrine and not required by any reading of the Bible but Archbishop Ussher's.

Question for debate: If you take the Bible as the literal Word of God, would it require a belief in a young Earth? What about a young Universe?

Notes: For the purposes of this debate, let's define young as less than 10,000 years, so we need not quibble over rounding errors and such.
Remember, for this debate we are discussing whether the young earth is a necessary consequence of taking the Bible as the literal Word of God, not whether the Bible is the literal Word of God. That question is for other debate threads.

[McCulloch]

The Bible and the Age of the Earth [Part I]
by Bert Thompson, Ph.D.

A simple, straightforward reading of the biblical record indicates that the Cosmos was created in six days only a few thousand years ago. [...]

There have been those who have objected to the suggestion that God is concerned with providing information on the age of the Earth and humanity. But the numerous chronological tables permeating the Bible prove that theirs is a groundless objection. God, it seems, was very concerned about giving man exact chronological data and, in fact, was so concerned that He provided a precise knowledge of the period back to Abraham, plus two tables—with ages—from Abraham to Adam. The ancient Jewish historians (1 Chronicles 1:1-27) and the New Testament writers (Luke 3:34-48) understood the tables of Genesis 5 and 11 as literal and consecutive. The Bible explains quite explicitly that God created the Sun and Moon to be timekeepers (Genesis 1:16) for Adam and his descendants (notice how Noah logged the beginning and the ending of the Flood using these timekeepers, Genesis 7:11; 9:14).

Still others have suggested that the two tables somehow are symbolic. But the use (or even repetitive use) of a “unique� number does not necessitate a symbolical interpretation. Special numbers (such as 7,10,12,40, etc.) employed in Scripture may be understood as literal despite the frequency with which they are used. Are there not three literal members of the Godhead? Did not Sceva have seven literal sons? Were there not ten literal commandments? Did Jesus not choose twelve literal apostles? Was Christ’s fast in the wilderness not forty literal days? Moreover, those who study history routinely recognize that it abounds with numerical “coincidences.� To say that the tables of Genesis 5 and 11 are “symbolic� of long periods of time flies in the face of the remainder of the biblical record.
[...]
While it is true that genealogies (and chronologies) serve various functions in Scripture, one of their main purposes is to show the historical connection of great men to the unfolding of Jehovah’s redemptive plan. These lists, therefore, are a link from the earliest days of humanity to the completion of God’s salvation system. In order to have any evidential value, they must be substantially complete.
[...]
Was chronology of importance to the biblical writers? Indeed it was. Does the Bible speak, then, in any sense, concerning the age of the Earth or the age of humanity on the Earth? Indeed it does. [...] I do contend, however, that the Bible gives a chronological framework that establishes a relative age for the Earth—an age confined to a span of only a few thousand years.
[...]
In a fascinating article several years ago, Wayne Jackson observed that in order to accommodate the biblical record only as far back as the appearance of man’s alleged evolutionary forebear (approximately 3.6 million years), one would have to insert 291,125 years in between each of the remaining 13 generations from Abraham to Adam as provided in Luke’s genealogy (1978, 14[18]:1). It does not take an overdose of either biblical knowledge or common sense to see that this quickly becomes ludicrous in the extreme for two reasons. First, who could believe that the first seven of these generations are so exact while the last thirteen are so inexact? Is it proper biblical exegesis to suggest that the first seven listings are correct as written, but gaps covering more than a quarter of a million years may be inserted between each of the last thirteen? Second, what good would all of this do anyone? All it would accomplish is the establishment of a 3.6 million year-old Earth; old-Earth creationists, progressive creationists, and theistic evolutionists need a 4.6 billion year-old Earth. So, in effect, all of this insertion of “gaps� into the biblical text is much ado about nothing.

And therein lies the point. While it may be true on the one hand to say that an exact age of the Earth is unobtainable from the information contained within the genealogies, at the same time it is important to note that—using the best information available to us from Scripture—the genealogies hardly can be extended to anything much beyond 6,000 to 7,000 years. For someone to suggest that the genealogies do not contain legitimate chronological information, or that the genealogies somehow are so full of gaps as to render them useless, is to misrepresent the case and distort the facts.
[...]
In Mark 10:6, Jesus declared concerning Adam and Eve: “But from the beginning of the creation, Male and female made he them.� Christ thus dated the first humans from the creation week. The Greek word for “beginning� is arché, and is used of “absolute, denoting the beginning of the world and of its history, the beginning of creation.� The word in the Greek for “creation� is ktiseos, and denotes “the sum-total of what God has created�
[...]
Furthermore, Paul affirmed the following:

• For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse (Romans 1:20, emp. added).

The apostle declared that from the creation of the world the invisible things of God have been: (a) clearly seen; and (b) perceived. The phrase, “since the creation of the world,� translates the Greek, apo ktiseos kosmou. As a preposition, apo is used “to denote the point from which something begins� (Arndt and Gingrich, 1957, p. 86). The term “world� is from the Greek, kosmos, and refers to “the orderly universe� (Arndt and Gingrich, p. 446). The term “perceived� translates the Greek noeo, which is used to describe rational, human intelligence. The phrase, “clearly seen� is an intensified form of horao, a word that “gives prominence to the discerning mind� (Thayer, 1962, p 452). Both “perceived� and “clearly seen� are present tense forms, and as such denote “the continued manifestation of the being and perfections of God, by the works of creation from the beginning� (MacKnight, 1960, p. 58).

Who perceived the things that were made “from the beginning� of the creation? If no man was there for billions of years (because man “is a relative newcomer to the Earth�), who was observing—with human intelligence—these phenomena? There can be no doubt that Paul was teaching that man has existed since the creation of the world and has possessed the capacity to comprehend the truth regarding the existence of the Creator; accordingly, those who refuse to glorify Him are without excuse. It likewise is inexcusable for one who professes to believe the Bible as God’s inspired Word to wrest such verses merely to defer to evolutionary geology. Yet examples of that very thing are all too prevalent.

[emphasis in the original]

[officer2002]

Also: For the record, I never said that Paul was not Jewish. I said that there was doubt about it, and there is.

Linguistic and cultural issues aside, his attitude toward the Law was far from the Jewish norm at his or any other time. He regarded the Law as a trial and a burden and as leading to death and not life. That is as bizarre to Jews as describing the Gospel as "the Bad News" would be to Christians. Pick a Psalm; Jews have always regarded the Law as "a lamp to my feet and a light to my path," sweet as honey, a delight, and God's greatest gift.

Paul also taught that the entire Law must be fulfilled and followed to the letter or else it is totally broken and the believer condemned, and that has never been Jewish teaching, either.

Paul said those things about the Law after he converted! Those sayings are no proof of his pre-conversion beliefs or ancestory!

You complained about Christians who do not understand Judiasm. I want to understand what God meant in the revelations he gave to his ancient prophets more than I want to understand a false understanding believed by the descendants of the people among whom the prophets were living.

[cnorman18]

Also: For the record, I never said that Paul was not Jewish. I said that there was doubt about it, and there is.

Linguistic and cultural issues aside, his attitude toward the Law was far from the Jewish norm at his or any other time. He regarded the Law as a trial and a burden and as leading to death and not life. That is as bizarre to Jews as describing the Gospel as "the Bad News" would be to Christians. Pick a Psalm; Jews have always regarded the Law as "a lamp to my feet and a light to my path," sweet as honey, a delight, and God's greatest gift.

Paul also taught that the entire Law must be fulfilled and followed to the letter or else it is totally broken and the believer condemned, and that has never been Jewish teaching, either.

Paul said those things about the Law after he converted!

No doubt; but he presents them as the teachings of Judaism, and they weren't.

If he had a new understanding of the Law, that's fine; but the alternative he presents to belief in Jesus was a false one. It did not exist in his time or any other.

Those sayings are no proof of his pre-conversion beliefs or ancestory!

If he understood Jewish teachings on those matters, then he was lying about Judaism; if he didn't, his Jewishness - or at least his familiarity with Judaism as it was actually practiced and believed - remains questionable.

You complained about Christians who do not understand Judiasm.

I don't complain; indeed I have often remarked on how understandable it is. My intent is to educate.

I want to understand what God meant in the revelations he gave to his ancient prophets more than I want to understand a false understanding believed by the descendants of the people among whom the prophets were living.

That's okay with me, as long as you know and acknowledge what that supposedly "false understanding" was and is.

Paul didn't - or if he did, he misrepresented it.