عصير كتاب: مسألة أيام لـ هيو روس A Matter of Days By Hugh Ross

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy

By: Hugh Ross

للتحميل: (PDF) (DOC)

Introduction: The Dawn of a New Day

· I founded the evangelistic organization Reasons to Believe, in part, because of my concern for those who cannot reconcile the young-earth concept with their scientific observations. I write this book to show how the record of nature affirms Scripture’s truthfulness and how the Bible affirms the trustworthiness of nature’s record. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 354-356). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 1: Flash Point

· Given scientists’ tendency toward independence and nonconformity, the suggestion that millions of them would band together to carry out a plot to mislead the public seems unimaginable. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 383-384). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The controversy over the age of the universe and Earth is strictly an internecine debate among evangelical Christians, Jews, and Muslims. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 386-387). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· I came to trust in Jesus as my Savior after a two-year personal study of the Bible that convinced me that Scripture is free of contradiction and error— doctrinally, historically, and scientifically. But as a young man, I couldn’t find a church or Christian group (within walking or bicycling distance from my Canadian university) that upheld biblical inerrancy. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 390-393). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Astronomers now have produced stunningly detailed images of the universe when it was just 0.003 percent of its present age. (Mark Peplow, “Planck Snaps Infant Universe,” Nature 495 (March 28, 2013): 417– 18; P. Ade, G. Efstathiou, et al. (Planck Collaboration), “Planck 2013 Results. XVI. Cosmological Parameters,” Astronomy and Astrophysics (forthcoming): DOI: 10.1051/ 0004-6361/ 201321591; A. Jaffe et al. (Planck Collaboration), “Planck 2013 Results. XXVI. Background Geometry and Topology of the Universe,” Astronomy and Astrophysics (forthcoming): DOI: 10.1051/ 0004-6361/ 201321546; C. L. Bennett et al., “Nine-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Final Maps and Results,” Astrophysical Journal Supplemental Series 208 (October 2013): id. 20; G. Hinshaw et al., “Nine-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Cosmological Parameter Results,” Astrophysical Journal Supplemental Series 208 (October 2013): id. 19.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 420-421). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Peplow, “Planck Snaps Infant Universe,” 417– 18; P. A. R. Ade et al. (Planck Collaboration), “Planck 2013 Results. XXII. Constraints on Inflation,” Astronomy and Astrophysics (forthcoming): DOI: 10.1051/ 0004-6361/ 201321569; Bennett et al., “Final Maps and Results,” id. 20. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4883-4885). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· An example of this line of reasoning is articulated in the book Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion, and Morality: The fundamentalist argument against the scientific assertion of the great age of our planet— to the effect that God created the earth only about 6,000 years ago, including fossils embedded in rocks— is unworthy of serious discussion.… It is now recognized by every intelligent and informed person that the two [Genesis and science] cannot be reconciled.… Nor should we be guilty of the error of assuming that the problem relates only to Genesis. It touches the New Testament as well. [Steve Allen, Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion, and Morality (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1990), 19– 20.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 445-449). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· “If you are a Creationist, the Bible— not nature— dictates what you believe.” [Robert M. Hazen and James Trefil, Science Matters: Achieving Scientific Literacy (New York: Doubleday, 1991), 243.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Location 451). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· “The spurious stories in Genesis are simply absurd. Yet, they do represent a conceptual framework from the undisciplined imagination of a prescientific age.” [H. James Birx, Interpreting Evolution: Darwin and Teilhard de Chardin (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1991), 98.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 452-453). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· “The biblical story of creation has great poetic beauty and metaphorical power.” [Hazen and Trefil, Science Matters, 244.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 453-454). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Atheist Michael Ruse goes even further: “There are degrees of being wrong. The Creationists are at the bottom of the scale. They pull every trick in the book to justify their position. Indeed, at times they verge right over into the downright dishonest.… Their arguments are rotten, through and through.” [Michael Ruse, Darwinism Defended: A Guide to the Evolution Controversies (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1982), 303, 321.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 456-458). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The Bible never states that the world is only several thousands of years old. It does not add up the years of the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11 to infer a conclusion about humanity’s antiquity. In this respect the Bible appears to place little importance on the questions of the when of creation. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 461-463). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· More than twenty lengthy creation-related passages within Scripture (see table 6) emphasize most strongly the who of creation. To a significant degree, they explain the how of creation. And to a much lesser degree, they discuss the when of creation. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 463-465). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Young-universe Christians claim that the Bible can only be interpreted as teaching that all creation took place in six consecutive 24-hour days about 10,000 (104) years ago. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 470-472). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In the 1930s, mathematician Sir Arthur Eddington rejected big bang cosmology so as to “allow evolution an infinite time to get started.” [Arthur S. Eddington, “On the Instability of Einstein’s Spherical World,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 90 (May 1930): 672.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 484-485). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In the 1980s, biochemist Harold Morowitz demonstrated that if all the chemical bonds in the simplest known independent life-form were broken, then under ideal naturalistic conditions it would take 10^{100,000,000,000} years for those atoms to reassemble into that life-form. [Robert Shapiro, Origins: A Skeptic’s Guide to the Creation of Life on Earth (New York: Summit Books, 1986), 128.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 486-488). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Science is an attempt to interpret the facts of nature. Christian theology is an attempt to interpret the words of the Bible. According to that theology, God created the universe and is responsible for the words of the Bible. Since the Bible repeatedly declares that God cannot lie, no contradiction can exist between the words of the Bible and the facts of nature. In the past, both the facts of nature and the Bible’s words have been misinterpreted and such misinterpretations have been identified and corrected. Therefore, any conflict between scientific findings and Christian theology must be attributed to human misunderstanding or misinterpretation. Such conflicts need not cast doubt on the integrity of the Christian faith or raise suspicion toward all science and scientists. Such conflicts indicate that further research is needed. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 497-503). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 2: The Gathering Storm

· In 1642, just 31 years after completion of the King James translation of the Bible, Cambridge University Vice-Chancellor John Lightfoot published his voluminous calculation of the exact date for the creation of the universe: September 17, 3928 BC. He arrived at this conclusion by analyzing the genealogies in Genesis, Exodus, 1 and 2 Kings, and 1 and 2 Chronicles. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 522-524). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Eight years later, Anglican Archbishop of Ireland James Ussher corrected Lightfoot’s date. His copious commentary and calculations changed it to October 3, 4004 BC. Ussher’s work also derived specific dates for every historical event mentioned in the Bible. [James Ussher, The Annals of the World (London: E. Tyler for J. Crook and G. Bedell, 1658).] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 524-526). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In a final round of academic sparring, Lightfoot adjusted Ussher’s date. He concluded that all creation took place the week of October 18– 24, 4004 BC, with the creation of Adam occurring on October 23 at 9: 00 AM, 45th meridian time. This extraordinarily precise conclusion provoked considerable mirth among both Bible scholars and critics, but its far-reaching effects are nothing to laugh about. [Edwin Tenney Brewster, Creation: A History of Non-Evolutionary Theories (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1927), 109, quoted in Bernard Ramm, The Christian View of Science and Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1954), 174.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 526-529). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Both Lightfoot and Ussher ignored Hebrew scholarship and assumed no generations were omitted from the biblical genealogies. They also assumed the Genesis 1 creation days to be six consecutive 24-hour periods. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 532-533). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Many young-earth creationists react to being labeled “Ussherites.” Though they agree with Ussher that the Genesis creation days are six consecutive 24-hour periods, some deny his assumption that no generations were omitted from the biblical genealogies. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 540-542). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Young-earth creationists who believe there are gaps in the genealogies estimate that the universe was created anywhere from 10,000 to 50,000 years ago. From their perspective, the deviation from Ussher’s date is significant. But the difference between their dates and Ussher’s date and the range of dates affirmed by science is only about 0.0001 percent. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 542-545). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Four major objections to his theory arose: It denied the divine creation of the various species of life. It declared life-forms capable of generating new species rather than consistently reproducing after their own kind. It implicitly denied the special creation of humanity. Its agency of change— natural selection— required vastly more time than Ussher’s time frame allowed. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 610-613). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 3: The Clouds Burst

· James Orr wrote: You say there is the “six days” and the question whether those days are meant to be measured by the twenty-four hours of the sun’s revolution around the earth— I speak of these things popularly. It is difficult to see how they should be so measured when the sun that is to measure them is not introduced until the fourth day. Do not think that this larger reading of the days is a new speculation. You find Augustine in early times declaring that it is hard or altogether impossible to say of what fashion these days are, and Thomas Aquinas, in the middle ages, leaves the matter an open question. To my mind these narratives in Genesis stand out as a marvel, not for its discordance with science, but for its agreement with it. [James Orr, “The Early Narratives of Genesis,” in The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth, ed. A. C. Dixon, Louis Meyer, and Reuben A. Torrey, vol. 6 (Chicago: Testimony Publishing, 1917), 94.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 644-650). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Gary North, an influential “reconstructionist” theologian (see “Reconstruction and Presuppositionalism”) makes this statement: The Bible’s account of the chronology of creation points to an illusion.… The seeming age of the stars is an illusion.… Either the constancy of the speed of light is an illusion, or the size of the universe is an illusion, or else the physical events that we hypothesize to explain the visible changes in light or radiation are false inferences. [Gary North, The Dominion Covenant: Genesis, rev. ed. (Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1987), 254– 55.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 728-731). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Whitcomb, another ICR associate … says, “There could be no genuine creation of any kind without an initial appearance of age inherent in it.… If God exists!— then there is no reason why He could not, in full conformity with His character of truth, create a whole universe full-grown” [John C. Whitcomb Jr., The Early Earth (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1972), 30.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 734-737). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Both ICR and Answers in Genesis— now the most prominent and vocal advocates of a recently created universe and Earth— rely to some degree on this theory of apparent versus real age. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 738-739). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Morris implies that no tool of science can ever yield real information on the age of the earth: “The compelling Biblical… direct testimony from the Creator is the only way to know the age of the earth” [“Morris Debates for Young Earth at Wheaton,” Acts and Facts 15, no. 8 (1986): 5.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 739-741). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· We could have been created just a few hours, or even moments ago, by a Creator who implanted scars, memories, family members, photographs, material possessions, liver spots, and hardening of the arteries to make us look and feel older than we really are. If God built into the universe a testimony of events that never took place, one can say that the Bible is a written testimony of events that never really happened. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 753-755). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· If ages in the natural realm are indeed illusory, then no amount of scientific evidence means anything against young-earth interpretations of the Bible’s words. Thus, these interpretations remain safe from outside influences. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 762-763). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· North agrees: “For Christians to tamper with the plain meaning of the Bible in order to make it conform to the latest findings of this or that school of evolutionary thought is nothing short of disastrous.” [North, The Dominion Covenant, 417.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 772-773). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· I have discussed faith issues with people who were convinced that becoming a Christian would require them to reject all knowledge except that found in Scripture. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 785-786). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· God is the initiator of both the biblical revelation and the created revelation (natural world). God renders both the words of the Bible and the facts of nature true and consistent. God’s character and attributes are expressed specifically (propositionally) in the Bible and generally (intelligibly) in nature, and neither negates or contradicts the other. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 787-789). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In 1992, the ICR published an article in its Back to Genesis magazine about the importance of belief in a young earth for determining a person’s role in the church and in ministry. The article’s author, John Morris, concludes: I still am uncertain about young-earth creationism being a requirement for church membership; perhaps it would be proper to give new members time to grow and mature under good teaching. But I do know one thing: [Young-earth] Creationism should be made a requirement for Christian leadership! No church should sanction a pastor, Sunday school teacher, deacon, elder, or Bible-study leader who knowledgeably and purposefully errs on this crucial doctrine. [John D. Morris, “Should a Church Take a Stand on Creation?,” Back to Genesis, no. 41 (May 1992): d.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 796-801). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 4: Wisdom of the Ages

· As recently as 2001, Ligon Duncan and David Hall wrote,   The day-age view [Genesis 1 creation days = six long time periods] first arose when jazz was on the rise in America.… Conversely, the 24-hour view [Genesis 1 creation days = six consecutive 24-hour periods] has been the consensus of the Church since the earliest hymns, chants, and doxologies, and long before Bach and Handel. If ever the Church agreed on anything, it has been on the days of creation. The paradigm shift occurred only recently when naturalistic and/ or rationalistic paradigms were enthroned and Scripture was made subservient to them. [Duncan and Hall, “The 24-Hour View” and “The 24-Hour Reply,” 47, 52, 99.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 823-828). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Genesis 1: 1– 31, which describes the six creation days (known as the Hexameron), receives more commentary from early church scholars than does any other text in the Bible. However, of the approximately 2,000 surviving pages of the commentary on the Hexameron, only about two pages address the duration of the creation days. Clearly, the early church fathers did not consider the length of these days a major doctrinal point. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 833-836). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The earliest scholars to record their thoughts about the Hexameron were Jewish— Philo (c. 13 BC– between AD 45 and 50) and Josephus (c. AD 37– c. 100). Philo expressed the notion that God created everything instantaneously and that the six days are figurative, a metaphor for order and completeness. “He [Moses] says that in six days the world was created, not that its Maker required a length of time for His work, for we must think of God as doing all things simultaneously, remembering that ‘all’ includes[—] with the commands which He issues[—] the thought behind them. Six days are mentioned because for the things coming into existence there was need of order.” [Philo Judaeus, “De Opificio Mundi” (On the Account of the World’s Creation Given by Moses), in Philo, trans. F. H. Colson and G. H. Whitaker (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1949), 1: 13.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 840-844). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Philo amplified his reasoning in a later work: It is quite foolish to think that the world was created in six days or in a space of time at all. Why? Because every period of time is a series of days and nights, and these can only be made such by the movement of the sun as it goes over and under the earth; but the sun is a part of heaven, so that time is confessedly more recent than the world. It would therefore be correct to say that the world was not made in time, but that time was formed by means of the world, for it was heaven’s movement that was the index of the nature of time. When, then, Moses says, “He finished His work on the sixth day,” we must understand him to be adducing not a quantity of days, but a perfect number, namely six. [Philo Judaeus, “Legum Allegoria” (Allegorical Interpretations of Genesis II, III, Book I, section 2), in Philo, 1: 146– 49.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 845-850). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In a survey of the Genesis creation days, Josephus noted the need to explain the meaning of the expression “one day” and promised to do so, but never did. One might wonder whether he found this expression neither easy nor straightforward to interpret. [Flavius Josephus, “The Antiquities of the Jews,” in The Life and Works of Flavius Josephus, trans. William Whiston (Philadelphia: John C. Winston, 1957), 32.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 851-853). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The earliest-known Christian writings on the meaning of the creation days date back to the second century. Justin Martyr (c. AD 100– 165) and Irenaeus (c. AD 120– 140 to 200– 203) drew support from Psalm 90: 4 and 2 Peter 3: 8 to suggest that at least one of the creation days could be an epoch of perhaps 1,000 years. [Justin Martyr, “Dialogue with Trypho, chapter 81,” in The Fathers of the Church, ed. Ludwig Schopp, vol. 6, Writings of Saint Justin Martyr (New York: Christian Heritage, 1948), 277– 78; Irenaeus, “Against Heresies, Book V, Chapter XXIII, Section 2,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, vol. 1, Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus (1885; repr., Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1981), 551– 52.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 853-856). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Describing the events of the sixth creation day, Irenaeus stated, In the day they [Adam and Eve] did eat, in the same did they die, and became death’s debtors, since it was one day of the creation. For it is said, “There was made in the evening, and there was made in the morning one day.” Now in this same day that they did eat, in that also did they die.… On one and the same day on which they ate they also died (for it is one day of creation).… He (Adam) did not overstep the thousand years, but died within their limit… for since “a day of the Lord is as a thousand years,” he did not overstep the thousand years, but died within them. [Irenaeus, “Against Heresies,” 551– 52.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 856-861). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Hippolytus (c. AD 170– 235) apparently wrote more extensively than others on the Genesis creation days, but most of his writings have been lost. What scholars have recovered gives no explicit indications of what he believed about the duration of the creation days or about dates for creation beyond his statements that humans have resided on Earth for only several thousand years. [Hippolytus, “The Refutation of All Heresies” and “The Extant Works and Fragments,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, rev. by A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 5, Fathers of the Third Century: Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix (1886; repr., Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1999), 77, 91, 104, 118– 19, 150– 51, 163.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 863-866). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Clement of Alexandria (c. AD 150 to 211– 215) echoed Philo’s belief that the Hexameron were not 24-hour days. 9 He claimed that the creation days communicated the order and priority of created things but not time. As he understood it, creation could not take place in time since “time was born along with things which exist.” [Clement of Alexandria, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 2: 513.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 866-869). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Origen (c. AD 185– 254) taught that in approaching certain difficulties in Scripture we should seek a spiritual meaning, not always a concrete one. In the six creation days he saw just such a difficulty. [Origen, “Book IV, Chapters I and II,” in On First Principles, trans. G. W. Butterworth (New York: Harper and Row, 1966), 277– 78; Origen, “Against Celsus, Book VI, Chapter LX,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, vol. 4, Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1979), 600– 1.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 869-871). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· He claimed that time as we mark it did not exist until the fourth day. “The text said that “there was evening and there was morning,” it did not say: “the first day,” but said, “one day.” It is because there was not yet time before the world existed. But time begins to exist with the following days.” [Origen, “The Homilies on Genesis: Homily I,” in The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, trans. Ronald E. Heine and ed. dir. Hermigild Dressler, vol. 71, Origen: Homilies on Genesis and Exodus (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1982), 48.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 871-873). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Now what man of intelligence will believe that the first, and the second, and the third day, and the evening and the morning existed without the Sun, Moon, and stars? [Origen, On First Principles, 288.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 874-875). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· He [Celsus] knows nothing of the day of the Sabbath and rest of God, which follows the completion of the world’s creation, and which lasts during the duration of the world, and in which all those will keep festival with God who have done all their works in their six days, and who, because they have omitted none of their duties will ascend to the contemplation (of celestial things) and to the assembly of righteous and blessed beings. [Origen, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 4: 601.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 878-881). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Writing later in the third century, Lactantius of North Africa, Victorinus of Pettau, and Methodius of Olympus all indicated in their writings that many of their contemporaries espoused the idea that just as there were seven days of creation, so there would follow thereafter seven days of human history in which each such day would last for 1,000 years. Psalm 90: 4 and 2 Peter 3: 8 were the scriptural basis for this idea (which was supported by Justin Martyr and Irenaeus). [Lactantius, “The Divine Institutes, Book VII, Chapter XIV,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, rev. by A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 7, Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily, and Liturgies (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1999), 211; Victorinus, “The Created World, Book VI,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 7: 342; Methodius, “Fragment: Extracts from the Work on Things Created,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, eds. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, rev. by A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 6, Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1999), 310.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 882-885). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· However, it would be an incorrect extrapolation to conclude that Lactantius, Victorinus, and Methodius believed that the Genesis creation days lasted 1,000 years each. In their surviving writings we have from them they never clarified their belief about the duration of the Hexameron. [Lactantius, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 7: 211; Victorinus, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 7: 341– 43; Methodius, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, 6: 379– 81.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 885-887). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In The City of God, this esteemed scholar wrote, “As for these ‘days,’ it is difficult, perhaps impossible to think— let alone explain in words— what they mean.” [Augustine, “Book XI, Chapter 6,” in The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, trans. Gerald G. Walsh and G. Monahan, ed. dir. Roy Joseph Defferrari, vol. 14, The City of God, Books VIII– XVI (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1952), 196.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 889-890). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In The Literal Meaning of Genesis he added, “But at least we know that it [the Genesis creation day] is different from the ordinary day with which we are familiar.” [Augustine, “Book Five: The Two Narratives and the Casual Reasons,” in Ancient Christian Writers: The Works of the Fathers in Translation, eds. Johannes Quasten, Walter J. Burghardt, and Thomas Comerford Lawler, no. 41, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, trans. and annotated by John Hammond Taylor, vol. 1, books 1– 6 (New York: Paulist Press, 1982), 148.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 891-892). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In the same book he added this comment: “Seven days by our reckoning after the model of the days of creation, make up a week. By the passage of such weeks time rolls on, and in these weeks one day is constituted by the course of the sun from its rising to its setting; but we must bear in mind that these days indeed recall the days of creation, but without in any way being really similar to them.” [Augustine, “Book Four: Reflections on the Days of Creation and God’s Rest,” in Ancient Christian Writers, 135.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 892-895). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Augustine understood the evenings and mornings of the Genesis creation days in a figurative sense. He concluded that the evening of each creation day referred to the occasion when the angels gazed down on the created things after they contemplated the Creator, and that the morning referred to the occasion when they rose up from their knowledge of the created things to praise the Creator. [Augustine, “Book Four: Reflections on the Days of Creation and God’s Rest,” in Ancient Christian Writers, 136.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 895-898). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In Confessions, Augustine noted that for the seventh day Genesis makes no mention of an evening and a morning. He deduced from this omission that God sanctified the seventh day, making it an epoch extending onward into eternity. [Augustine, “Book XIII, Section 51,” in The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, trans. Vernon J. Bourke, vol. 21, Confessions (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1953), 455.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 898-900). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Basil (c. AD 329– 379), also a bishop of Caesarea, wrote at least nine homilies on the first chapter of Genesis. He hinted at the difficulty of discovering the date for the universe’s creation: “You may know the epoch when the formation of the world began, if, ascending into the past, you endeavour to discover the first day. You will thus find what was the first movement of time.” [Basil, “The Hexameron,” in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, second series, eds. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, vol. 8, Basil: Letters and Select Works, trans. Blomfield Jackson (1895, repr., Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1955), 55.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 909-911). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Ambrose (perhaps thinking about Genesis 2: 4, where yôm refers to the entire creation week) acknowledged, “There are many who call even a week one day, because it returns to itself, just as one day does, and one might say seven times revolves back on itself.” [Ambrose, “Saint Ambrose: Hexameron,” in The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, trans. John J. Savage, ed. dir. Roy Joseph Deferrari, vol. 42, Hexameron, Paradise, Cain and Abel (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1961), 42, 43] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 925-927). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· As theoretical chemist and apologist John Millam noted in “Coming to Grips with the Early Church Fathers’ Perspective on Genesis,” neither the duration of the creation days nor the age of the earth “was ever listed as part of the ‘rule of faith’ (Latin regula fidei), which was a statement of key doctrine.” [John Millam, “Coming to Grips with the Early Church Fathers’ Perspective on Genesis, Part 5 (of 5),” Today’s New Reason to Believe (blog), posted October 6, 2011, http:// http://www.reasons.org/ articles/ coming-to-grips-with-the-early-church-fathers-perspective-on-genesis-part-5-of-5.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 935-937). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Concerning the universe and Earth, the fathers took a united and explicit stand on only two doctrines. The first is that the universe has a beginning, implying that it has existed for only a finite time. The second is what they termed “creation ex nihilo,” the belief that God created the universe out of nothing. By “nothing” they meant that the universe we detect did not come from any entity we can conceivably detect (Hebrews 11: 3). [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 938-941). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 5: The Creedal Climate

· The Belgic Confession further affirms that the created realm supplies a true record of what God has done: We know him [God] by two means: First, by the creation, preservation, and government of the universe, since that universe is before our eyes like a beautiful book in which all creatures, great and small, are as letters to make us ponder the invisible things of God: his eternal power and his divinity, as the apostle Paul says in Romans 1: 20. All these things are enough to convict men and to leave them without excuse. Second, he makes himself known to us more openly by his holy and divine Word. [See article 2, Ecumenical Creeds, 79.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 996-1001). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 6: Toward Better Interpretations

· First, the Bible declares its message to be true: God is not a man, that he should lie. (Numbers 23: 19) The words of the Lord are flawless. (Psalm 12: 6) The law of the Lord is perfect.… The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy.… The precepts of the Lord are right. (Psalm 19: 7– 8) All [God’s] words are true. (Psalm 119: 160) Every word of God is flawless. (Proverbs 30: 5) The Scripture cannot be broken. (John 10: 35) It is impossible for God to lie. (Hebrews 6: 18) God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1: 5) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1073-1077). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. (Psalm 19: 1– 4)

· Romans 1: 18– 20 shows how clearly God speaks through the record of nature: The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities— his eternal power and divine nature— have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1082-1085). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Language differences increase the difficulty of comprehending the meaning of the creation “day.” The entire Old Testament, except for Aramaic portions of Daniel (2: 4b– 7: 28) and Ezra (4: 8– 6: 18), comes to us from ancient Hebrew. The New Testament is written in koinē Greek, the common dialect (as opposed to Attic or classical Greek) of the first century AD. The Hebrew and Greek languages of today differ in several ways from biblical Hebrew and Greek. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1091-1094). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In his recent book on evolution and creationism, emeritus biology professor John Moore commented that “science and religion still use very different thought patterns— one based on evidence and the other on belief.” [John A. Moore, From Genesis to Genetics: The Case of Evolution and Creationism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 204.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1129-1131). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The biblical and scientific interpretive process, especially as applied to a given physical event or sequence of events, includes eight essential steps: Collect relevant texts and observations. Identify the frame( s) of reference for each. Determine the context and initial conditions for the event( s). Determine what takes place, when, and where, and the sequence of events within each text or observation. Note the final conditions. Form a tentative interpretation to explain both the how and the why of the event or sequence. Examine the tentative interpretation in light of additional relevant texts and observations, eliminate extraneous data, and add any previously overlooked important information. Revise the initial interpretation as necessary to achieve consistency with all available information. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1159-1166). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 7: Anchored in Scripture

· Genesis 1 records a dramatic story: “within six days” God miraculously transformed a “formless and void” Earth into a well-furnished home for humanity. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1221-1222). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Ancient Hebrews most often marked 24-hour days with “evening to evening” (see for example Leviticus 23: 32). The “and there was evening, and there was morning” expression in Genesis 1 is unique. Therefore, the repeated word-for-word translation of the Hebrew text used in Genesis 1 for the six creation days—“ and there was evening, and there was morning”— alerts the reader that these days may have been periods other than 24-hour days. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1339-1342). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The fossil record provides confirmation of an ongoing biblical seventh day, a day of cessation from cosmic creative activity. According to the fossils, more and more species of life came into existence during the millennia before humans. The number of new species more than balanced the number going extinct. Then came the human species. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1445-1447). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Biologists Paul and Anne Ehrlich report, “The production of a new animal species in nature has yet to be documented.… In the vast majority of cases, the rate of change is so slow that it has not even been possible to detect an increase in the amount of differentiation.” [Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich, Extinction: The Causes and Consequences of the Disappearance of Species (New York: Ballantine, 1981), 23.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1450-1452). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· سفر الجامعة، الإصحاح 1، العدد 4 (دَوْرٌ يَمْضِي وَدَوْرٌ يَجِيءُ وَالأَرْضُ قَائِمَةٌ إِلَى الأَبَدِ.)

· The brief span of a 3,000-year terrestrial history (in the historical context of the authors of Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Micah, Habakkuk, and 2 Peter) seems a possible but unlikely metaphor for God’s eternality. That time span would have been no greater than recorded human history and only three times longer than Methuselah’s life span. The fact that the Bible does consider the antiquity of the mountains and the founding of the earth suitable metaphors for God’s eternality conveys the image of an ancient planet. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1470-1474). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· حبقوق 3 / 6 وَقَفَ وَقَاسَ الأَرْضَ. نَظَرَ فَرَجَفَ الأُمَمُ وَدُكَّتِ الْجِبَالُ الدَّهْرِيَّةُ وَخَسَفَتْ آكَامُ الْقِدَمِ. مَسَالِكُ الأَزَلِ لَهُ.

· بطرس الثانية 3 / 5 و6 لأَنَّ هَذَا يَخْفَى عَلَيْهِمْ بِإِرَادَتِهِمْ: أَنَّ السَّمَاوَاتِ كَانَتْ مُنْذُ الْقَدِيمِ وَالأَرْضَ بِكَلِمَةِ اللَّهِ قَائِمَةً مِنَ الْمَاءِ وَبِالْمَاءِ، اللَّوَاتِي بِهِنَّ الْعَالَمُ الْكَائِنُ حِينَئِذٍ فَاضَ عَلَيْهِ الْمَاءُ فَهَلَكَ.

Chapter 8: Guided by Theology

· It takes time for light to travel along the space surface of the universe and enter an astronomer’s telescope. The universe is now sufficiently ancient that light from the cosmic creation event has had the necessary time to reach telescopes on Earth. Consequently, astronomers can “witness” God’s act of bringing the universe into existence.   If God had placed humans on Earth any earlier than about 13.8 billion years after the cosmic creation event, then humanity would have been unable to observe one of the most potent scientific evidences for God as the Creator of all physical reality. The earlier we humans enter the cosmic scene (relative to the 13.8 billion years), the smaller the fraction of cosmic history available for observation. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1565-1570). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The converse is also true. The accelerating expansion of the universe due to the effect of dark energy6 will eventually cause the radiation from the cosmic creation event to move away from us at greater than the velocity of light. From that point onward astronomers will lose their capacity to witness the earliest moments of the universe’s creation. The later humans enter the cosmic scene (relative to the 13.8 billion years), the smaller the fraction of cosmic history we can study. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1570-1574). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The bottom line is that God created humans at the best possible time in the history of the universe for us to see His glory and righteousness revealed in the heavens. To word it another way, only at about 14 billion years after the cosmic creation event can humans observe all of cosmic history and witness the creation of the universe. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1574-1576). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Jesus said, “At the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female’” (Mark 10: 6). Ken Ham, Henry Morris, and John Morris have claimed this statement implies that virtually no time transpired between the creation of the universe and the creation of Adam and Eve. [Henry Morris, Biblical Creationism: What Each Book of the Bible Teaches about Creation and the Flood (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2000), 148; John Morris, “Did Jesus Believe in Creation?,” Back to Genesis, no. 27 (March 1991): d; Kenneth Ham, “Is God an Evolutionist?,” Back to Genesis, no. 3 (March 1989): a; Henry M. Morris, “The Bible and Jesus Christ,” Back to Genesis, no. 125 (May 1999): c.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1631-1633). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· However, even from a young-earth perspective on the creation week, this interpretation of Mark 10: 6 cannot be correct. Adam and Eve were not created until the sixth creation day, after the creation of the universe and the earth. Therefore, Adam and Eve could not have been present at the beginning of the universe. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1635-1637). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The Greek phrase translated “the beginning of creation” in Mark 10: 6 is archēs ktiseos (a Greek equivalent for “the” is missing). [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1638-1639). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Two fallacies underlie this line of reasoning. One is that God’s speed in creating correlates with His power. It does not. Six days would be too long. For that matter, six nanoseconds would be too long. If time were the measure of His power, God would have created everything in an immeasurable instant. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1661-1663). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The second fallacy lies in the assumption that an all-powerful God is under compulsion to exercise all His power all the time. He is not. A man capable of running a four-minute mile may choose— for any number of reasons— to walk a mile in 15 minutes. God also can choose whatever time frame He pleases. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1663-1665). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The second fallacy lies in the assumption that an all-powerful God is under compulsion to exercise all His power all the time. He is not. A man capable of running a four-minute mile may choose— for any number of reasons— to walk a mile in 15 minutes. God also can choose whatever time frame He pleases. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1663-1665). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 9: Good God, Cruel World

· One emotional lightning rod stands taller than all others in the creation-day controversy: “Allowing for the millions of years for the fossil layers means accepting death, bloodshed, disease, and suffering before Adam’s sin.” [Ken Ham, Jonathan Sarfati, and Carl Wieland, The Revised and Expanded Answers Book: The 20 Most-Asked Questions About Creation, Evolution and the Book of Genesis Answered!, ed. Don Batten (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2000), 257.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1676-1677). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In this case, Adam and Eve’s rebellion against God in the Garden of Eden must be responsible for all the death and extinction experienced in nature. Such a view of Adam’s sin, however, seems to imply that God meted out sudden punishment on plants and animals who did nothing to deserve His wrath, or that He couldn’t or wouldn’t protect the rest of creation from man’s offense. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1690-1693). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The absence of all plant and animal death before Adam’s sin, however, poses just as great a problem for three 24-hour creation days as it does for three long eras. Many species of life can’t survive even three hours without food, and the mere ingestion of food by animals requires the death of plants or at least plant parts. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1698-1700). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· كورينثوس الأولى 15 / 21 فَإِنَّهُ إِذِ الْمَوْتُ بِإِنْسَانٍ، بِإِنْسَانٍ أَيْضاً قِيَامَةُ الأَمْوَاتِ.

· We especially tend to anthropomorphize the animals we raise as pets. But animal suffering of any kind cannot be equated with human suffering. The awareness and anticipation of future agony, physical or spiritual or both, greatly intensifies human pain. Animals, by contrast, neither anticipate nor worry about the future. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1766-1768). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· To some, the suffering of plants seems perfectly acceptable within the scope of God’s love, while the suffering of animals does not. Some express little concern over the pain, suffering, and death of insects. But all physical life suffers and dies. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1775-1776). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Even if all Earth’s living biomass were continuously converted into biodeposits with 100 percent efficiency, young-earth models cannot explain the extent of the biodeposits. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1796-1797). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Some young-earth creation scientists recognize the challenges biodeposits present to their models. [Walt Brown, In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood, 5th ed. (Phoenix, AZ: Center for Scientific Creation, 1989), 58– 84; Jonathan Sarfati, Refuting Compromise: A Biblical and Scientific Refutation of “Progressive Creationism” (Billions of Years) as Popularized by Astronomer Hugh Ross, 2nd ed. (Atlanta, GA: Creation Book Publishers, 2011), 273– 74, 279– 80, 368– 70.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Location 1799). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Blaming all death on Adam and Eve alone, however, overlooks the fact that they were not the first creatures to sin against God. According to Scripture, Satan was the first. His self-exaltation incurred spiritual death— eternal separation from God (Ezekiel 28: 14– 18). The Bible does not specify the timing of Satan’s initial rebellion. Clearly, it occurred before God allowed him to enter into the Garden of Eden. Job 38: 7 tells us that angels existed when God laid the foundations of the earth. It is possible that Satan sinned before this event. He may have sinned even before God created the universe. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1849-1853). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In Genesis 1, the creation is called “good” and “very good” but not “ultimate perfection.” Revelation 21 and 22 promise a vastly superior creation yet to come. This perfect creation follows God’s “wrapping up” of the present one. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1856-1858). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The second law of thermodynamics observes that heat flows from hot bodies to cold bodies. As a consequence of this heat flow, the universe becomes progressively more mixed or disordered over time. This increasing disorder or decay defines the principle termed entropy. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1919-1920). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The heart of the Christian gospel message is that true life can be achieved only through death. The Creator of the universe Himself had to die so that humans could receive eternal life. New life in Jesus Christ is possible only if we are willing to die to self, to put aside our right to lead our lives as we see fit, and give control of our life and destiny to the One who created us. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1944-1946). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Why, then, should any believer in God look upon death as something that is fundamentally bad in all contexts and counter to the will of God? Only through death can evil be conquered. Death for the Christian is in one sense a gift. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1949-1951). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 10: Peace through Paradise

· Consequently, they teach that the universe including Earth, the Sun, Moon, and stars, will exist into eternity. [Morris, Biblical Creationism, 210, 220; Henry M. Morris, “The Vital Importance of Believing in Recent Creation,” Back to Genesis, no. 138 (June 2000): c; Morris, “Finished Works of God”; Morris, “Coming Big Bang”; John C. Whitcomb, “The Bible and Astronomy,” in Design and Origins in Astronomy, ed. George Mulfinger Jr. (Norcross, GA: Creation Research Society Books, 1983), 144– 45.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Location 1988). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Henry Morris, founder of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR), defended the idea of an eternally existing universe with three Bible passages: (Henry M. Morris, “All Spaced Out,” Back to Genesis, no. 122 (February 1999): c.) 1.   He set them [the sun, moon, stars, highest heavens, and waters above the skies] in place for ever and ever; he gave a decree that will never pass away. (Psalm 148: 5– 6) 2.   I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. (Ecclesiastes 3: 14) 3.   They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever. (Daniel 12: 3, KJV) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1989-1995). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Their response: “No we can’t! The heavens and the earth were ‘finished’” (italics in original). As proof, they cite Hebrews 4: 3: “[ God’s] works were finished from the foundation of the world.” [Henry M. Morris, “Creation by Inflation and Quantum Fluctuation,” Back to Genesis, no. 129 (September 1999): b.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 1998-2000). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· A small sampling of verses cannot adequately support a doctrine of such significance as the future dwelling place for God’s chosen and redeemed people. Again, all relevant texts must be collected and their frames of reference identified. Using these criteria to compare interpretations reveals valuable insight. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2001-2003). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Six Old Testament creation accounts (Genesis 1; Genesis 2; Job 38– 41; Psalm 104; Proverbs 8; and Ecclesiastes 1– 3, 8– 12) consistently say that God’s creation of this universe is finished. However, these same accounts, along with others, make clear that natural processes established during the creation days continue. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2014-2016). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· العبرانيين 1 / 10 إلى 12 وَ«أَنْتَ يَا رَبُّ فِي الْبَدْءِ أَسَّسْتَ الأَرْضَ، وَالسَّمَاوَاتُ هِيَ عَمَلُ يَدَيْكَ. هِيَ تَبِيدُ وَلَكِنْ أَنْتَ تَبْقَى، وَكُلُّهَا كَثَوْبٍ تَبْلَى، وَكَرِدَاءٍ تَطْوِيهَا فَتَتَغَيَّرُ. وَلَكِنْ أَنْتَ أَنْتَ، وَسِنُوكَ لَنْ تَفْنَى».

Chapter 11: Young-Earth Darwinism?

· A Canadian university professor I know refers to evolution as “the E word,” a word so emotionally charged that its mere mention sparks lightning among Christians. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2129-2130). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In other words, a 14-billion-year-old universe is too young for any conceivable natural-process scenario to yield, on its own, even the simplest living organism. Yet biologists and chemists have spent years building naturalistic models based on these inadequate boundary conditions. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2141-2143). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The first chapter of Genesis (supported by other Bible passages) says God ceased to introduce new life-forms after the sixth creation day. (See Genesis 2: 2– 3; Psalm 95: 11; Hebrews 4: 1– 11.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2154-2155). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Even if all the animals aboard hibernated throughout the flood’s duration, the ark’s maximum carrying capacity by young-earth estimates would have been about 30,000 pairs of land animals. But the fossil record indicates the existence of at least 100,000,000 such species, of which more than 5,000,000— according to a recently completed quantification by biologists10— live on Earth today. (Whitcomb and Morris, The Genesis Flood, 66– 69.) (Thomas Kammer, “G331: The Nature and Adequacy of the Fossil Record,” Department of Geology and Geography at West Virginia University, accessed February 28, 2012, http:// http://www.geo.wvu.edu/ ~ kammer/ g231/ AdequacyFossilRecord.pdf; Gary K. Meffe, C. Ronald Carroll, and contributors, Principles of Conservation Biology, 2nd ed. (Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates, 1997), 90– 120.) (Camilo Mora et al., “How Many Species Are There on Earth and in the Ocean?,” PLOS Biology 9 (August 2011): DOI: 10.1371/ journal.pbio. 1001127; Meffe, Carroll, and contributors, Principles of Conservation Biology, 91– 93.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2166-2170). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The problem grows worse. Shortly after the flood, young-earthers say, a large portion of the 30,000 pairs on board— most notably dinosaurs— went extinct. So, the remaining few thousand species that survived the flood and its aftermath must have evolved (“ diversified”) by rapid and efficient natural processes into 7,000,000 or more species. [Whitcomb and Morris, The Genesis Flood, 66.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2171-2174). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In The Genesis Flood, Henry Morris and John Whitcomb suggest, for example, that zebras, horses, and several other horselike species evolved (“ diversified”) from a single horselike pair on the ark. [Henry Morris, Biblical Creationism: What Each Book of the Bible Teaches about Creation and the Flood (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2000), 36; Whitcomb and Morris, The Genesis Flood, 66– 69, 80– 87. (In particular, figure 4 on page 67 of The Genesis Flood shows zebras and horses evolving from a single horse-like pair on board Noah’s ark.)] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2176-2177). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In the creationist journal, Creation Ex Nihilo (now Creation), Don Batten of Creation Ministries International and theologian A. W. (Bill) Mehlert each published articles where they propose that the entire cat family— tigers, lions, leopards, cheetahs, panthers, bobcats, and even ancestors of housecats— evolved from either one, possibly two, or conceivably three cat pairs on Noah’s ark. [Don Batten, “Ligers and Wholphins? What’s Next?,” Creation 22 (June 2000): 28– 33; A. W. (Bill) Mehlert, “On the Origin of Cats and Carnivores,” Journal of Creation 9 (April 1995): 106– 20.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2178-2180). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Georgia Purdom and Bodie Hodge of Answers in Genesis (AiG) write, “After the Flood, the animals were told to ‘be fruitful and multiply on the earth’ (Genesis 8: 17). As they did this, natural selection, mutation, and other mechanisms allowed speciation within the kinds to occur.” [Bodie Hodge and Georgia Purdom, “Zonkeys, Ligers, and Wolphins, Oh My!,” Answers in Genesis, posted August 6, 2008, http:// http://www.answersingenesis.org/ articles/ aid/ v3/ n1/ zonkeys-ligers-wholphins? vm = r.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2183-2185). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· As Philip Kitcher, philosopher of science at Columbia University observes, “Rates of speciation ‘creation-science’ would require… are truly breathtaking, orders of magnitude greater than any that have been dreamed of in evolutionary theory.” [Philip Kitcher, “Born-Again Creationism,” in Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics: Philosophical, Theological, and Scientific Perspectives, ed. Robert T. Pennock (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001), 259.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2186-2188). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 12: Faith, Morality, and Long Creation Days

· Henry Morris of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR), described the perceived problem this way: “The continued insistence on an ancient earth is purely because of the philosophic necessity to justify evolution and the pantheistic religion of eternal matter.” [Henry M. Morris, “Recent Creation Is a Vital Doctrine,” Impact, no. 132 (June 1984): iv.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2360-2362). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· BSA leaders agree: [Old-earth] theology denies the central teaching of Christianity… and rejects the connection that Scripture establishes between sin, death, and Christ’s atonement.… In [this] theology death is natural. Death was a reality for millions of years before man ever arrived to sin. This leaves Christ’s death on the cross as, at best, well-meaning, but beside the point. [Bible Science Association, “Pulse,” 12.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2386-2389). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 13: Big Bang: The Bible Said It First

· In truth, the cosmic “bang” is an immensely powerful yet carefully planned and controlled burst of creation— a sudden release of power from which the universe unfurled in an exquisitely controlled expansion. In an instant, time, space, matter, and energy, along with the physical laws governing them all, came into existence from a source beyond the cosmos. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2475-2477). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Most textbooks addressing cosmology (study of the origin and structure of the universe) credit Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson with the discovery that the universe arose from a hot flash point. While these two were the first to detect the radiation left over from the creation event (in 1965), they were not the first scientists to recognize that the universe had expanded and cooled from an extremely hot and compact state. In 1925, astrophysicist and Jesuit priest Abbé Georges Lemaître became the first scientist to promote the idea of a big bang origin event. Observations made by Edwin Hubble in 1929 established that a certain phenomenon (called spectral line redshifts) of galaxies results from a general expansion of the universe from some beginning point. Then, in 1946, George Gamow calculated that the existing abundance of elements in the cosmos requires a nearly infinitely hot starting condition followed by relatively rapid cosmic expansion. [Arno A. Penzias and Robert W. Wilson, “A Measurement of Excess Antenna Temperature at 4080 Mc/ s,” Astrophysical Journal 142 (July 1965): 419– 21. 6.] [Georges Lemaître, “Expansion of the Universe, A Homogeneous Universe of Constant Mass and Increasing Radius Accounting for the Radial Velocity of Extra-Galactic Nebulae,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 91 (March 1931): 483– 90. For the original paper, see Annales de la Societé Scientifique de Bruxelles, Tome XLVII, Serie A, Premiere Partie (April 1927): 49. 7.] [Edwin Hubble, “A Relation between Distance and Radial Velocity Among Extra-Galactic Nebulae,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 15 (March 1929): 168– 73. The big bang singularity beginning is not a one-dimensional point but rather an infinitely shrunken volume. 8.] [George Gamow, “Expanding Universe and the Origin of the Elements,” Physical Review 70 (October 1946): 572– 73.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2501-2508). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The first theoretical evidence for a cosmic creation event dates back to 1916 when Albert Einstein noted that his field equations of general relativity predicted an expanding universe. Recognizing that such expansion implies a beginning, Einstein altered his theory to conform to the common wisdom of his day; namely, belief in an eternal universe. [Albert Einstein, “Die Grundlage der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie,” Annalen der Physik 354, no. 7 (1916): 769– 822. The English translation is in H. A. Lorentz et al., The Principle of Relativity: A Collection of Original Memoirs on the Special and General Theory of Relativity, trans. W. Perrett and G. B. Jeffrey (London: Methuen, 1923), 109– 64.] [Albert Einstein, “Kosmologische Betrachtungen zur allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie,” Sitzungsberichte der Königlich Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin), Seite, part 1 (February 8, 1917): 142– 52. The English translation is in Lorentz et al., The Principle of Relativity, 175– 88.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2509-2511). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Sir Arthur Eddington, one of the most famous early twentieth-century cosmologists, rejected the big bang since “it seems to require a sudden and peculiar beginning of things.” He added, “Philosophically, the notion of a beginning is repugnant to me.” [Arthur S. Eddington, “On the Instability of Einstein’s Spherical World,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 90 (May 1930): 672.] [Arthur S. Eddington, “The End of the World from the Standpoint of Mathematical Physics,” Nature 127 (March 21, 1931): 450.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2515-2517). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The Old Testament proclaims seven times that God created (bārāʾ) the entirety of the heavens. [See Genesis 1: 1; 2: 3; 2: 4; Psalm 148: 5; Isaiah 40: 26; 42: 5; 45: 18.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2527-2528). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Many hot big bang theories exist, and emerging observations of the universe will determine which of the several dozen variants is correct. But all hot big bang models share these fundamental characteristics: 1.   a transcendent cosmic beginning a finite time ago 2.   cosmic expansion from that beginning 3. ongoing cosmic cooling from an extremely hot initial temperature [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2572-2576). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· What’s more, the Bible alone among all the sacred writings of the world’s religions expounds these three big bang fundamentals. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2579-2580). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In 1989, John Maddox, physics editor for the prestigious journal Nature, wrote an editorial titled “Down with the Big Bang.” In it, this self-proclaimed atheist wishfully predicted that the big bang theory would not survive the initial observations coming from the Hubble Space Telescope. [John Maddox, “Down with the Big Bang,” Nature 340 (August 10, 1989): 425.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2581-2583). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In 1990, ICR joined in predicting that the big bang explanation for cosmic origins would die before the close of the twentieth century. [“Quotable Quotes,” Back to Genesis, no. 17 (May 1990): c.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2584-2585). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Exhaustive testing has affirmed general relativity as the best proven principle in physics [A list of recent tests, with references, can be found in my book The Creator and the Cosmos, 102– 7. Additional tests performed since publishing the third edition of The Creator and the Cosmos (2001) include: M. Bailes et al., “Self-Consistency of Relativistic Observables with General Relativity in the White Dwarf-Neutron Star Binary PSR J1141-6545,” Astrophysical Journal Letters 595 (September 20, 2003): L49– L52; Deepto Chakrabarty et al., “Nuclear-Powered Millisecond Pulsars and the Maximum Spin Frequency of Neutron Stars,” Nature 424 (July 3, 2003): 42– 44; R. Wijnands et al., “Quasi-Periodic X-Ray Brightness Fluctuations in an Accreting Millisecond Pulsar,” Nature 424 (July 3, 2003): 44– 47; Robert V. Wagoner, “Astronomy: Heartbeats of a Neutron Star,” Nature 424 (July 3, 2003): 27– 28; B. Bertotti, L. Iess, and P. Tortora, “A Test of General Relativity Using Radio Links with the Cassini Spacecraft,” Nature 425 (September 25, 2003): 374– 76; A. G. Lyne, “A Review of the Double Pulsar— PSR J0737-3039,” in Chinese Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Supplement 2 6, no. S2, 2005 Lake Hanas International Pulsar Symposium, eds. N. Wang et al. (2006): 162– 68; I. H. Stairs, “Binary Pulsars and Tests of General Relativity,” in Relativity in Fundamental Astronomy: Dynamics, Reference Frames, and Data Analysis, eds. Sergei A. Klioner, P. Kenneth Seidelmann, and Michael H. Soffel, Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union, vol. 5, Symposium 261 (2009): 218– 27; Nicolás Yunes and David N. Spergel, “Double-Binary-Pulsar Test of Chern-Simons Modified Gravity,” Physical Review D 80 (August 14, 2009): id. 042004; Lorenzo Iorio, “An Assessment of the Systematic Uncertainty in Present and Future Tests of the Lense-Thirring Effect with Satellite Laser Ranging,” Space Science Reviews 148 (December 2009): 363– 81; Lorenzo Iorio, “Conservative Evaluation of the Uncertainty in the LAGEOS-LAGEOS II Lense-Thirring Test,” Central European Journal of Physics 8 (February 2010): 25– 32; C. W. F. Everitt et al., “Gravity Probe B: Final Results of a Space Experiment to Test General Relativity,” Physical Review Letters 106 (May 31, 2011): id. 221101; Ignazio Ciufolini et al., “Phenomenology of the Lense-Thirring Effect in the Solar System: Measurement of Frame-Dragging with Laser Ranged Satellites,” New Astronomy 17 (April 2012): 341– 46; Adam Ingram, Chris Done, and P. Chris Fragile, “Low-Frequency Quasi-Periodic Oscillations Spectra and Lense-Thirring Precession,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters 397 (July 2009): L101– L105; J. F. C. Wardle et al., “The Ultra-Fast Quasar PKS 1510-089: Direct Evidence for a Changing Orientation of the Central Engine,” in Future Directions in High-Resolution Astronomy: A Celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the VLBA, eds. Jonathan D. Romney and Mark J. Reid, vol. 340 (San Francisco: Astronomical Society of the Pacific, 2005), 67; Ignazio Ciufolini et al., “Testing General Relativity and Gravitational Physics Using the LARES Satellite,” European Physical Journal Plus 127 (November 2012): id. 133; Angelo Tartaglia, “Experimental Tests of General Relativity: Where Are We?,” in Towards New Paradigms: Proceeding of the Spanish Relativity Meeting 2011, eds. J. Beltrán Jiménez et al., vol. 1458 (July 7, 2012), 269– 84; Jason N. Dossett, Jacob Moldenhauer, and Mustapha Ishak, “Figures of Merit and Constraints from Testing General Relativity Using the Latest Cosmological Data Sets Including Refined COSMOS 3D Weak Lensing,” Physical Review D 84 (July 26, 2011): id. 023012; David Rapetti et al., “Testing General Relativity on Cosmic Scales with the Observed Abundance of Massive Clusters,” Progress of Theoretical Physics Supplement 190 (October 2011): 179– 87; A. Claret, G. Torres, and M. Wolf, “DI Herculis as a Test of Internal Stellar Structure and General Relativity: New Apsidal Motion Rate and Evolutionary Models,” Astronomy and Astrophysics 515 (June 2010): id. A4.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2587-2588). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· the space-time theorems derived from general relativity establish a “singular” beginning for all the matter, energy, space, and time in the universe. [Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose, “The Singularities of Gravitational Collapse and Cosmology,” Proceedings of the Royal Society A 314 (January 27, 1970): 529– 48; Stephen W. Hawking and George F. R. Ellis, The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970); Jacob D. Bekenstein, “Nonsingular General-Relativistic Cosmologies,” Physical Review D 11 (April 15, 1975): 2072– 75; Leonard Parker and Yi Wang, “Avoidance of Singularities in Relativity through Two-Body Interactions,” Physical Review D 42 (September 15, 1990): 1877– 83; Arvind Borde, “Open and Closed Universes, Initial Singularities, and Inflation,” Physical Review D 50 (September 15, 1994): 3692– 702; Arvind Borde and Alexander Vilenkin, “Eternal Inflation and the Initial Singularity,” Physical Review Letters 72 (May 23, 1994): 3305– 8; Arvind Borde and Alexander Vilenkin, “Violation of the Weak Energy Condition in Inflating Spacetimes,” Physical Review D 56 (July 15, 1997): 717– 23; L. H. Ford and Thomas A. Roman, “Classical Scalar Fields and the Generalized Second Law,” Physical Review D 64 (June 22, 2001): id. 024023; Brandon Carter, “Energy Dominance and the Hawking-Ellis Vacuum Conservation Theorem,” submitted May 2, 2002 (contributed to Stephen Hawking’s 60th birthday workshop on the Future of Theoretical Physics and Cosmology, Cambridge, UK, January 2002): arXiv:gr-qc/ 0205010v1; Arvind Borde, Alan H. Guth, and Alexander Vilenkin, “Inflationary Spacetimes Are Incomplete in Past Directions,” Physical Review Letters 90 (April 15, 2003): id. 151301.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2588-2589). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· As Astronomy reported, “All roads of evidence lead to the Big Bang” and “no other theory even comes close” to the evidential base supporting it. [Jim Sweitzer, “Do You Believe in the Big Bang?,” Astronomy 30 (December 2002): 36.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 2638-2639). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 16: The Reliability of Radiometric Dating

· Attempts to date the Shroud of Turin offer an example of these radiometric dating limitations. Researchers at specialized laboratories in the United States, England, and Switzerland assured the shroud’s protectors that if it were genuinely a 2,000-year-old article, a four-square-inch sample of fabric would suffice to establish that fact. The carbon-14 studies placed the shroud’s origin in the thirteenth century AD, making it only about 800 years old— just outside the 900-year lower boundary for accuracy in carbon-14 dating. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3364-3368). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Those who wanted passionately to believe in the shroud’s authenticity as the burial cloth of Christ tried to seize this “inaccuracy” as a way to sustain their hope, but the three research teams have expressed certainty that, even considering the error margin, their carbon-14 measurement definitively rules out a first-century AD date, at least for that portion of the shroud. Each lab offered to provide a more precise and comprehensive date if they could test as much as a one-square-foot piece of the shroud and smaller pieces of other parts of the shroud. Their offers were declined.[ P. E. Damon et al., “Radiocarbon Dating of the Shroud of Turin,” Nature 337 (February 16, 1989): 611– 15.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3368-3372). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Recognizing that radioisotope dating establishes both a several-billion-year-old Earth and universe, the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) formed the RATE (Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth) research group in 1997 to search for ways to interpret radiometric decay in a young-earth context. [Larry Vardiman, “The First Young-Earth Conference on Radioisotopes,” Acts and Facts 26 (August 1997); ICR editors, “Radioisotope Dating: A Creationist Perspective,” Acts and Facts 26 (August 1997): 1.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3393-3395). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· After eight years of research the RATE group acknowledged that if radiometric decay rates are truly constant, then the universe and Earth must be billions of years old. [Larry Vardiman, Andrew Snelling, and Eugene F. Chaffin, eds., Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth: A Young-Earth Creationist Research Initiative, vol. 1 (El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 2000), 42– 44, 306– 7, 312– 13, 316– 18, 334– 37, 374.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3395-3396). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 17: The Scientific Case for a Young Cosmos

· The solar neutrino output and the observed radical oscillations establish that the Sun is currently in an extremely stable state. Its light emission has remained exceptionally steady over the past 50,000 years and will continue to remain exceptionally steady for the next 50,000. Given the observed structure of the Sun, this circumstance (essential for global human civilization) is physically impossible unless the Sun is “middle-aged,” that is, unless it has experienced nuclear burning for the past 4.5 billion years. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3702-3705). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Seven different measurements allow astronomers to determine the proportion of luminous matter relative to total matter: (1) angular sizes of the hot and cold spots in the cosmic background radiation; (2) velocities of distant galaxies relative to cosmic expansion; (3) extended rotation curves of galaxies; (4) X-ray gas fraction of mass for clusters of galaxies; (5) relative velocities for pairs of galaxies; (6) clustering of galaxies; and (7) degree of gravitational lensing exhibited by cosmic sources. [P. Ade, G. Efstathiou, et al. (Planck Collaboration), “Planck 2013 Results. XVI. Cosmological Parameters,” Astronomy and Astrophysics (forthcoming): DOI: 10.1051/ 0004-6361/ 201321591; G. Hinshaw et al., “Nine-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Cosmological Parameter Results,” Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series 208 (October 2013): id. 19; Ariel G. Sánchez et al., “The Clustering of Galaxies in the SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey: Cosmological Constraints from the Full Shape of the Clustering Wedges,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 433 (August 2013): 1202– 22; Catherine Heymans et al., “CFHTLenS Tomographic Weak Lensing Cosmological Parameter Constraints: Mitigating the Impact of Intrinsic Galaxy Alignments,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 432 (July 1, 2013): 2433– 53; Rachel Mandelbaum et al., “Cosmological Parameter Constraints from Galaxy– Galaxy Lensing and Galaxy Clustering with the SDSS DR7,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 432 (June 21, 2013): 1544– 75; Yungui Gong, Qing Gao, and Zong-Hong Zhu, “The Effect of Different Observational Data on the Constraints of Cosmological Parameters,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 430 (April 21, 2013): 3142– 54; Marcello Cacciato et al., “Cosmological Constraints from a Combination of Galaxy Clustering and Lensing – III. Application to SDSS Data,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 430 (April 1, 2013): 767– 86; Andrew B. Newman, “The Density Profiles of Massive, Relaxed Galaxy Clusters. II. Separating Luminous and Dark Matter in Cluster Cores,” Astrophysical Journal 765 (March 1, 2013): id. 25; B. A. Benson et al., “Cosmological Constraints from Sunyaev-Zel’dovich-Selected Clusters with X-Ray Observations in the First 178 deg2 of the South Pole Telescope Survey,” Astrophysical Journal 763 (February 1, 2013): id. 147; M. Tewes et al., “COSMOGRAIL: Measuring Time Delays of Gravitationally Lensed Quasars to Constrain Cosmology,” Messenger 150 (December 2012): 49– 52; Mark A. Norris et al., “The Globular Cluster Kinematics and Galaxy Dark Matter Content of NGC 3923,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 421 (April 1, 2012): 1485– 98; A. Feoli et al., “Cosmological Constraints from Supernova Data Set with Corrected Redshift,” Journal of Physics: Conference Series 354 (March 2012): id. 012005; Jeremy L. Tinker et al., “Cosmological Constraints from Galaxy Clustering and the Mass-to-Number Ratio of Galaxy Clusters,” Astrophysical Journal 745 (January 20, 2012): id. 16; M. C. March et al., “Improved Constraints on Cosmological Parameters from Type Ia Supernova Data,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 418 (December 21, 2011): 2308– 29; Heng Yu and Zong-Hong Zhu, “Combining Optical and X-Ray Observations of Galaxy Clusters to Constrain Cosmological Parameters,” Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics 11 (July 2011): 776– 86; J. Guy et al., “The Supernova Legacy Survey 3-Year Sample: Type Ia Supernova Photometric Distances and Cosmological Constraints,” Astronomy and Astrophysics 523 (November– December 2010): id. A7; Eric Jullo et al., “Cosmological Constraints from Strong Lensing in Clusters of Galaxies,” Science 329 (August 20, 2010): 924– 27; A. Del Popolo, V. Costa, and G. Lanzafame, “Improvements in the X-Ray Luminosity Function and Constraints on the Cosmological Parameters from X-Ray Luminous Clusters,” Astronomy and Astrophysics 514 (May 2010): id. A80; R. W. Schmidt and S. W. Allen, “The Dark Matter Haloes of Massive, Relaxed Galaxy Clusters Observed with Chandra,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 379 (July 2007): 209– 21.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3722-3725). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Some young-earth creationist leaders have widely publicized the supposed discovery of human footprints alongside prints clearly made by dinosaurs. [John C. Whitcomb and Henry M. Morris, The Genesis Flood: The Biblical Record and Its Scientific Implications (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1961), 173– 75; Carl E. Baugh and Clifford A. Wilson, Dinosaur: Scientific Evidence That Dinosaurs and Men Walked Together (Orange, CA: Promise, 1987); John D. Morris, Tracking those Incredible Dinosaurs— and the People Who Knew Them (San Diego, CA: Creation-Life, 1980). Note: John Morris has since changed his position to being agnostic about the evidence.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3845-3846). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· both secular and Christian scholars see insufficient basis for claiming that any of the footprints in question are human and abundant evidence to say they are not. [Berney Neufeld, “Dinosaur Tracks and Giant Men,” Origins 2, no. 2 (1975): 64– 76; Robert Schadewald, “Scientific Creationism and Error,” Creation/ Evolution 6 (Winter 1986): 5– 9; Glen J. Kuban, “A Summary of the Taylor Site Evidence,” Creation/ Evolution 6 (Winter 1986): 10– 18; Ronnie J. Hastings, “Tracking those Incredible Creationists— the Trail Continues,” Creation/ Evolution 6 (Winter 1986): 19– 27.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 3860-3861). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Planets as close to the Sun as Mercury and Venus are impacted dramatically by the Sun’s tidal torques over the course of a few billion years. Such forces slow down these planets’ rotation periods till they’re as slow as or even slower than their revolution rates. Thus, Mercury may appear to be, but actually is not, exhibiting angular momentum opposite to the rest of the planets. Any planet that rotates more slowly than it revolves merely seems to rotate backward (unlike planets that rotate more rapidly than they revolve). [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4012-4016). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Among all the solar system’s planets, only Earth maintains a stable rotation axis tilt. This stability exists because Earth is unique— a small planet orbited by a single large moon. The rest of the solar system’s planets experience some gradual change in their axial tilt. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4017-4018). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Any planet that has its rotation axis tilted by more than 90 ° will appear to rotate backward even though it begins by rotating frontward. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4020-4021). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Since the direction of capture is random, captured bodies will manifest a 50 percent probability of revolving in the direction opposite to that of the planet’s rotation and to the revolution of the planet’s indigenous moons. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4024-4026). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 18: Physical Reality Breaks through the Fog

· According to geology professor Ian Plimer, “Creationism has no intellectual framework. Creationism is an anti-intellectual attack on all of science.” [Ian Plimer, Telling Lies for God: Reason vs. Creationism (Milsons Point, NSW: Random House Australia, 1994), 39.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4072-4073). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Michael Ruse, professor of history and philosophy of science, wrote, “Creationists are obviously so impervious to the effects of empirical evidence.” [Michael Ruse, Darwinism Defended: A Guide to the Evolution Controversies (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1982), 319.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4076-4077). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Ken Ham affirmed that “when sin defaced the image of God back in the Garden of Eden, it marred man’s ability to think.” [Kenneth Ham, “Don’t Be Afraid of ‘Giants,’” Back to Genesis 6 (June 1989): b.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4123-4124). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Science says: The universe is billions of years old, but only billions, not quadrillions of years old or a near-infinite age. Theological significance: Religious and philosophical systems depending on infinite or near-infinite age have no foundation in reality. (These include most New Age and Eastern religions as well as many atheistic, naturalistic philosophies.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4158-4161). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 19: Narrow Time Windows

· Even though our solar system contains eight planets and thousands of moons and asteroids, life can survive on only one of those bodies— planet Earth. (However, the remains of life inevitably will be found on several other solar system bodies as a result of the export of Earth life through meteoritic bombardment.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4203-4206). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In order for a planet to support life, the rotation period must fit within a certain range. If the rotation period is too long, then temperature differences between day and night will be too great. But if the rotation period is too short, then atmospheric jet streams will manifest too little latitudinal variation and wind velocities will reach levels too high for advanced life. These findings indicate that if Earth were any younger than about 4 billion years, it would rotate too rapidly for advanced life to exist. If it were any older than about 6 billion years, it would rotate too slowly. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4251-4255). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· A naturalistic scenario for life’s origin lies beyond the realm of possibility because several billion years is hopelessly too brief (by many orders of magnitude) to explain life’s genesis, development, and existence by strictly natural processes. [Michael H. Hart, “Atmospheric Evolution, the Drake Equation, and DNA: Sparse Life in an Infinite Universe,” in Physical Cosmology and Philosophy, ed. John Leslie (New York: Macmillan, 1990), 263– 64; Hubert P. Yockey, “An Application of Information Theory to the Central Dogma and the Sequence Hypothesis,” Journal of Theoretical Biology 46 (August 1974): 369– 406; Hubert P. Yockey, “On the Information Content of Cytochrome c,” Journal of Theoretical Biology 67 (August 7, 1977): 345– 76; Hubert P. Yockey, “A Calculation of the Probability of Spontaneous Biogenesis by Information Theory,” Journal of Theoretical Biology 67 (August 7, 1977): 377– 98; Hubert P. Yockey, “Self Organization Origin of Life Scenarios and Information Theory,” Journal of Theoretical Biology 91 (July 7, 1981): 13– 31; Hubert P. Yockey, Information Theory and Molecular Biology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 231– 309.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4275-4277). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· In summary, given the laws and constants of physics that God established from the beginning, nature testifies that God created primitive physical life at the earliest possible moment. Following that moment, God continued to create new life-forms of the just-right types, abundances, and diversities, and at the just-right times, to set the stage for the earliest possible entrance of humanity. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4279-4282). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 20: The Significance of Man

· Some of the specific manifestations of the human spirit include: awareness of right and wrong, good and evil, and a moral code “written” or impressed with a conscience; awareness of mortality and concerns about life after death; yearning for purpose, hope, and destiny; a thirst to discover and the capacity to recognize truth and absolutes; and a propensity to worship and a desire to communicate with a higher Being. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4309-4313). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· If the life spans recorded in the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies are approximately proportional to the actual passage of time, then the dates for Abraham and Peleg would place the flood of Noah’s day roughly 30,000 to 50,000 years ago and the creation of Adam and Eve a few tens of thousands of years earlier. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4323-4325). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The past 20 years’ research shows that we all came from the same location and from just a few individuals or less. 14 Or, to put it another way, the data is consistent with all humanity’s descent from a single woman and a single man. [Eva-Liis Loogväli et al., “Explaining the Imperfection of the Molecular Clock of Hominid Mitochondria,” PLoS ONE, published online December 29, 2009: DOI: 10.1371/ journal.pone. 0008260, http:// http://www.plosone.org/ info% 3Adoi% 2F10.1371% 2Fjournal.pone. 0008260; David Caramelli et al., “Evidence for a Genetic Discontinuity between Neandertals and 24,000-Year-Old Anatomically Modern Europeans,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 100 (May 27, 2003): 6593– 97; Lev A. Zhivotovsky, Noah A. Rosenberg, and Marcus W. Feldman, “Features of Evolution and Expansion of Modern Humans, Inferred from Genomewide Microsatellite Markers,” American Journal of Human Genetics 72 (May 2003): 1171– 86; Martin Richards et al., “In Search of Geographical Patterns in European Mitochondrial DNA,” American Journal of Human Genetics 71 (November 2002): 1168– 74; Antonio Salas et al., “The Making of the African mtDNA Landscape,” American Journal of Human Genetics 71 (November 2002): 1082– 111; Mark G. Thomas, “Founding Mothers of Jewish Communities: Geographically Separated Jewish Groups Were Independently Founded by Very Few Female Ancestors,” American Journal of Human Genetics 70 (June 2002): 1411– 20.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4354-4356). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· By measuring DNA differences across several generations in different families, geneticists can measure the rates at which mtDNA and Y-DNA mutations occur. Such measures yield dates of 42,000 to 60,000 years ago for the most recent common male ancestor (the biblical Noah) and, taking into account that ten to twenty percent of the human population possesses two types of mitochondrial DNA (heteroplasmy) and a little less than one percent possesses three types (triplasmy), about 50,000 to 70,000 years ago for the most recent common female ancestor (the biblical Eve). [Daniel Garrigan et al., “Inferring Human Population Sizes, Divergence Times and Rates of Gene Flow from Mitochondrial, X and Y Chromosome Resequencing Data,” Genetics 177 (December 2007): 2195– 207; Ornella Semino et al., “Ethiopians and Khoisan Share the Deepest Clades of the Human Y-Chromosome Phylogeny,” American Journal of Human Genetics 70 (January 2002): 265– 68; J. K. Pritchard et al., “Population Growth of Human Y Chromosomes: A Study of Y Chromosome Microsatellites,” Molecular Biology and Evolution 16 (December 1999): 1791– 98; Russell Thomson et al., “Recent Common Ancestry of Human Y Chromosomes: Evidence from DNA Sequence Data,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 97 (June 20, 2000): 7360– 65; Peter A. Underhill et al., “Y Chromosome Sequence Variation and the History of Human Populations,” Nature Genetics 26 (November 2000): 358– 61; L. Simon Whitfield, John E. Sulston, and Peter N. Goodfellow, “Sequence Variation of the Human Y Chromosome,” Nature 378 (November 23, 1995): 379– 80; Nicholas Wade, Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors (New York: Penguin, 2006), 54.] [Lois A. Tully et al., “A Sensitive Denaturing Gradient-Gel Electrophoresis Assay Reveals a High Frequency of Heteroplasmy in Hypervariable Region 1 of the Human mtDNA Control Region,” American Journal of Human Genetics 67 (August 2000): 432– 43; Ann Gibbons, “Calibrating the Mitochondrial Clock,” Science 279 (January 2, 1998): 28– 29.] [Loogväli et al., “Explaining the Imperfection,” DOI: 10.1371/ journal.pone. 0008260; Phillip Endicott and Simon Y. W. Ho, “A Bayesian Evaluation of Human Mitochondrial Substitution Rates,” American Journal of Human Genetics 82 (April 11, 2008): 895– 902; Phillip Endicott et al., “Evaluating the Mitochondrial Timescale of Human Evolution,” Trends in Ecology and Evolution 24 (September 2009): 515– 21; Dan Graur and William Martin, “Reading the Entrails of Chickens: Molecular Timescales of Evolution and the Illusion of Precision,” Trends in Genetics 20 (February 2004): 80– 86; Erika Hagelberg, “Recombination or Mutation Rate Heterogeneity? Implications for Mitochondrial Eve,” Trends in Genetics 19 (February 2003): 84– 90; Max Ingman et al., “Mitochondrial Genome Variation and the Origin of Modern Humans,” Nature 408 (December 7, 2000): 708– 13; Pedro Soares et al., “Correcting for Purifying Selection: An Improved Human Mitochondrial Molecular Clock,” American Journal of Human Genetics 84 (June 12, 2009): 740– 59.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4360-4365). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 21: A Clear “Day” Interpretation

· No author writing more than 3,400 years ago could have accurately described these events and their sequence, plus the initial conditions, without divine inspiration. If God guided the words of Moses to scientific and historical accuracy in this complex report of divine activity, we have reason to believe that we can trust God to communicate with perfection through all the other Bible writers as well. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4504-4507). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· 1. God created, by fiat miracle, the entire physical universe (10 space-time dimensions, matter, energy, galaxies, stars, planets, etc.). Note: Earth is empty of and unfit for life. Earth’s atmosphere and interplanetary debris prevent the light of the Sun, Moon, and stars from reaching the surface of Earth’s ocean. The ocean covers the Earth’s whole surface. 2. God cleared away most interplanetary debris and partially transformed Earth’s atmosphere (making it translucent) so that light from the heavenly bodies could penetrate to the surface of Earth’s ocean. 3. God formed the troposphere with just-right conditions to establish an adequately abundant and stable water cycle. 4. God formed ocean basins and continental landmasses. 5. God produced plants on the continental landmasses. 6. God transformed the atmosphere from translucent to (occasionally) transparent. 7. God produced swarms of small sea animals. 8. God created, by fiat miracle, birds and sea mammals. 9. God created, by fiat miracle, land mammals capable of interacting with the (future) human race. Evidence for the role of the nonhuman bipedal primates comes from the late Pleistocene extinction rates for large-bodied mammals. The arrival of human beings in Australia, which has no history of prehuman bipedal primates, brought about the extinction of 94 percent of all mammal genera (with adults weighing more than 40 kilograms or 88 pounds). 11 For sub-Sahara Africa, which had at least eight distinct species of pre-human bipedal primates, the extinction rate for mammals was less than 5 percent. 12 10. God created, by fiat miracle, the human species (specifically Adam and Eve). [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Location 4518-4542). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· One possible scenario is that in the time period prior to Adam and Eve’s creation God made a sequence of bipedal primate species, each more skillful at hunting than the one before. Birds and mammals would then have developed better behavioral defenses against the future onslaught of humanity. God may have had other reasons as well for creating bipedal primates— reasons scientists are as yet incapable of discerning. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4546-4549). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 22: Councils Attempt to Bring Calm

· The first serious attempt to reconcile the creation-day controversy was undertaken by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI). Founded in 1977 by a large group of conservative Christian scholars, the ICBI convened annually (or more often) over the course of 10 years. The council’s primary purpose was to define and defend the doctrine of biblical inerrancy as “an essential element for the authority of Scripture and a necessity for the health of the church.” [James Montgomery Boice, Does Inerrancy Matter? (Oakland, CA: International Council of Biblical Inerrancy, 1979), 2.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4590-4593). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· The final affirmations and denials on Scripture and science published by the ICBI are as follows: We affirm that any preunderstandings which the interpreter brings to Scripture should be in harmony with scriptural teaching and subject to correction by it. We deny that Scripture should be required to fit alien preunderstandings, inconsistent with itself, such as naturalism, evolutionism, scientism, secular humanism, and relativism. We affirm that since God is the author of all truth, all truths, biblical and extra-biblical, are consistent and cohere, and that the Bible speaks truth when it touches on matters pertaining to nature, history, or anything else. We further affirm that in some cases extrabiblical data have value for clarifying what Scripture teaches, and for prompting correction of faulty interpretations. We deny that extrabiblical views ever disprove the teaching of Scripture or hold priority over it. We affirm the harmony of special with general revelation and therefore of biblical teaching with the facts of nature. We deny that any genuine scientific facts are inconsistent with the true meaning of any passage of Scripture. We affirm that Genesis 1– 11 is factual, as is the rest of the book. We deny that the teachings of Genesis 1– 11 are mythical and that scientific hypotheses about earth history or the origin of humanity may be invoked to overthrow what Scripture teaches about creation. [Earl D. Radmacher and Robert D. Preus, eds., Hermeneutics, Inerrancy, and the Bible: [papers from the ICBI Summit II] (Grand Rapids, MI: Academie Books, 1984), 901– 3.] [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Location 4608-4620). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· (The records of the ICBI are archived at Dallas Theological Seminary and both the ICBI’s full statements on biblical inerrancy [http:// library.dts.edu/ Pages/ TL/ Special/ ICBI_1. pdf] and biblical hermeneutics [http:// library.dts.edu/ Pages/ TL/ Special/ ICBI_2. pdf] are publicly available as PDFs at http:// library.dts.edu/ Pages/ TL/ Special/ ICBI.shtml.) [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4624-4627). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

· Following two years of deliberations, the PCA panel published a 92-page report. That report outlined four different views of the creation days deemed acceptable within the bounds of Christian orthodoxy: Calendar-day: creation days consist of six consecutive 24-hour periods that are historical and chronological. Day-age: creation days are six consecutive long ages that are historical, sequential, and chronological. Framework: the creation week is a metaphor to narrate God’s actions in creation with the days to be understood as topical rather than sequential and the durations as unspecified. Analogical-days: creation days are analogous to, but not necessarily identical to, human days; that is, broadly consecutive but of unspecified length. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4636-4642). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

Chapter 23: Tranquility through Testing

· Models, by definition, are explanatory scenarios constructed from theory and observations and sufficiently detailed for testing. Effective models attempt to explain not only how a particular phenomenon arises and develops but also why. They are capable of predicting future discoveries and anticipating breakthroughs. [Hugh Ross, A Matter of Days: Resolving a Creation Controversy (Kindle Locations 4715-4718). RTB Press. Kindle Edition.]

الحمد لله الذي بنعمته تتمّ الصَّالِحات