1:1 In the beginning God created * the heaven and the earth.
This is the beginning of the Bible. The words: "In the" are not in the original Hebrew language. They are added in the English translation. So the Bible begins with the word Beginning. Beginning often means first fruit. God does not consider the beginning to be when the seed begins to sprout and take root. God considers the beginning when the tree begins to produce fruit. We are told a tree that does not produce fruit has no real value other then to be cut down and thrown into the fire. I enjoy an expository approach to the Bible where we really do an in-depth study of what the original Hebrew words mean. Often if we look at all the passages where that word is used then from context we can start to understand the meaning of that word. Or there are good Bible dictionaries we can use like Vines or Smiths. In this case the Hebrew word for Beginning can also mean like the first born. The oldest child is often the child that is expected to set a good example for the others to follow. Even this can mean a leader like a Chief or a Captain.
Beginning can actually have many different meaning. For a GAP beginning tends to mean the beginning of this age or era that we currently live in. This takes place around 12,900 years ago. There is a natural event at the time where they find a layer of nano diamonds that they believe came from a nano-diamond asteroid hitting the earth. This for me is a marker for the exact day when this age or era that we live in first began. This can be very exact because they find these nano-diamonds in Greenland in the ice core samples. Every layer they believe represents a year. So they know exactly when this asteroid hit the earth. At this time there was a mass extinction. I am not saying the asteroid has anything to do with the extinction. I only use this as a marker to come up with an exact date. This was the end of the Ice age. So the world was going through a lot of changes. Ice was melting and the water level was rising. This was also a time of population explosion as the weather became warmer.
Of course the question is, what was happening with man at this time. If we go back 40,000 years ago we see some very interesting artifacts begin to show up. We see sowing needles, as people began to be able to make clothing for themselves. This means they could travel north where it was colder. At the time this means modern humans could move into bio-diverse ecology that Neanderthal men were living in. The Bible will say that one must increase as the other will decrease. This is to maintain the balance in the ecosystem. Other artifacts we find from 40,000 years ago are spear heads, fishing nets and fishing hooks. We see these items up to 300 miles away from where they are made.
It is around this time: 10,000 to 12,000 years ago that we find the beginning of Gobekli Tepe. This is known as the Oldest Temple. They have been working on this site for over 12 years now and so far have uncovered a very small part of it. They perhaps only have discovered 3% of what there is to learn here. So this is clearly a work in progress. What we have are very large stones that have been cut and place in exact positions to make buildings. The stones are covered with a plaster and they have art painting on them. This is a very clear advance when it comes to having artifacts to examine and to study. Even they say people did not actually live here. They were still hunter gathers. Farming had not begun. They have not found any pottery on this site yet. Although they have found pottery in China going back maybe as far as 20,000 years. In the middle east there is no pottery so they perhaps did not have alcohol yet. They still carried their grains and their fruit in woven baskets.
This is the beginning that I talk about. This is the first word in the Bible. Now I have no problem with people that consider the beginning to be the Big Bang or something like that. For me and for GAP creationism the beginning was around 12,970 years ago. A day is equal to 1,000 years. Of course I also except OEC or the day age theory where a day is equal to millions or even billions of years. I just do not try to explain that. I have no problem at all with YEC. If they want to begin 6,000 years ago with Adam and Even in the Garden of Eden that is fine with me. We do not read about Adam and Eve until the second Chapter in the Bible. There is a LOT of science that tells us about what was going on at that point in time. We have the beginning of the domestication of plants and animals. We have the beginning of farming and the beginning of cities and civilization.
I do not know what to talk about next so maybe I will just start to answer questions.
This is the beginning of the Bible. The words: "In the" are not in the original Hebrew language. They are added in the English translation. So the Bible begins with the word Beginning. Beginning often means first fruit. God does not consider the beginning to be when the seed begins to sprout and take root. God considers the beginning when the tree begins to produce fruit. We are told a tree that does not produce fruit has no real value other then to be cut down and thrown into the fire. I enjoy an expository approach to the Bible where we really do an in-depth study of what the original Hebrew words mean. Often if we look at all the passages where that word is used then from context we can start to understand the meaning of that word. Or there are good Bible dictionaries we can use like Vines or Smiths. In this case the Hebrew word for Beginning can also mean like the first born. The oldest child is often the child that is expected to set a good example for the others to follow. Even this can mean a leader like a Chief or a Captain.
Beginning can actually have many different meaning. For a GAP beginning tends to mean the beginning of this age or era that we currently live in. This takes place around 12,900 years ago. There is a natural event at the time where they find a layer of nano diamonds that they believe came from a nano-diamond asteroid hitting the earth. This for me is a marker for the exact day when this age or era that we live in first began. This can be very exact because they find these nano-diamonds in Greenland in the ice core samples. Every layer they believe represents a year. So they know exactly when this asteroid hit the earth. At this time there was a mass extinction. I am not saying the asteroid has anything to do with the extinction. I only use this as a marker to come up with an exact date. This was the end of the Ice age. So the world was going through a lot of changes. Ice was melting and the water level was rising. This was also a time of population explosion as the weather became warmer.
Of course the question is, what was happening with man at this time. If we go back 40,000 years ago we see some very interesting artifacts begin to show up. We see sowing needles, as people began to be able to make clothing for themselves. This means they could travel north where it was colder. At the time this means modern humans could move into bio-diverse ecology that Neanderthal men were living in. The Bible will say that one must increase as the other will decrease. This is to maintain the balance in the ecosystem. Other artifacts we find from 40,000 years ago are spear heads, fishing nets and fishing hooks. We see these items up to 300 miles away from where they are made.
It is around this time: 10,000 to 12,000 years ago that we find the beginning of Gobekli Tepe. This is known as the Oldest Temple. They have been working on this site for over 12 years now and so far have uncovered a very small part of it. They perhaps only have discovered 3% of what there is to learn here. So this is clearly a work in progress. What we have are very large stones that have been cut and place in exact positions to make buildings. The stones are covered with a plaster and they have art painting on them. This is a very clear advance when it comes to having artifacts to examine and to study. Even they say people did not actually live here. They were still hunter gathers. Farming had not begun. They have not found any pottery on this site yet. Although they have found pottery in China going back maybe as far as 20,000 years. In the middle east there is no pottery so they perhaps did not have alcohol yet. They still carried their grains and their fruit in woven baskets.
This is the beginning that I talk about. This is the first word in the Bible. Now I have no problem with people that consider the beginning to be the Big Bang or something like that. For me and for GAP creationism the beginning was around 12,970 years ago. A day is equal to 1,000 years. Of course I also except OEC or the day age theory where a day is equal to millions or even billions of years. I just do not try to explain that. I have no problem at all with YEC. If they want to begin 6,000 years ago with Adam and Even in the Garden of Eden that is fine with me. We do not read about Adam and Eve until the second Chapter in the Bible. There is a LOT of science that tells us about what was going on at that point in time. We have the beginning of the domestication of plants and animals. We have the beginning of farming and the beginning of cities and civilization.
I do not know what to talk about next so maybe I will just start to answer questions.
