Boy Earth Creationism
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The young earth creationism ( English Young Earth creationism ) is a direction of creationism , which assumes that the earth and the life on it before more than 10,000 years ago by the direct action of God were created. It is represented by believers who assume that the six days of creation and one rest day mentioned in Genesis correspond to 24 hours each and that they seamlessly describe the first week after an absolute beginning of time. The content of the entire Bible is, in their eyes, a truthful historical account from which the magnitude of the time since then can be calculated. The followers are also of the opinion that the statements of the Bible in the context of a creation science take precedence over natural science or at least equal status.
History of Young Earth Creationism
origin
Young earth creationism has its earliest roots in Judaism . Thus the view that the earth was young and was created in six days, e.g. B. shared by Flavius Josephus (1st century Jewish historian). The time that has passed since then has been estimated in modern times to be a maximum of 10,000 years based on the age information in the biblical gender tables.
Until the late 19th century, however, geologists such as Charles Lyell empirically cited earth ages in the billions, which were in complete contradiction to known physics. According to Lord Kelvin's thermodynamic calculations, which were completely indisputable in the evidence, on the maximum duration of a cooling of a glowing liquid earth, an earth age over 24 million years was impossible according to the physical knowledge of the time. This only changed with the discovery of radioactivity . This blatant contradiction did not prevent the geologists from further developing their theses, which were effective for the public, and on which the development of an independent scientific tradition of descriptive, historically working geo- and life sciences is based. Christian theology responded, among other things, with the development of a text-critical interpretation of the Bible, including in the life of Jesus research , in which David Friedrich Strauss tried to transform the biblical texts and church beliefs and dogmas derived from them into philosophical ideas, without using them as truths of faith to give up. Within the church there was a contradiction between literal interpretation of the Bible and a critical interpretation of the text.
Decline as a scientific hypothesis
Support for young earth creationism declined from the 18th century onwards with the development of the new science of geology . The early geologists believed that the earth must be old in order to explain the vast amount of geological phenomena that could be observed. James Hutton , now considered the father of modern geology, believed that the earth must be much older. He even said she was infinitely old.
Hutton's main argument was that the phenomena of the earth's surface that he saw could not have arisen in a short period of time as a result of a catastrophe, but that the same processes that can be observed on earth today had produced them (principle of uniformity ). Since all of these processes are slow, the earth must be old to bring about these changes. After a short time, science came to an age of a few million years - still short compared to today's numbers, but far more than the few thousand years of a literal interpretation of the Bible.
Hutton's thoughts were popularized by Sir Charles Lyell in the early 19th century. Lyell's energetic efforts brought the public and the scientific community to embrace the notion of an ancient earth. By the middle of the century, established science had rejected young earth creationism as a serious hypothesis . Many of the leading geologists of the time were clergy themselves, such as B. Reverend William Buckland , the first professor of geology at Oxford University . Many religious groups also abandoned young earth creationism as a literal description of earth's history and came to the view that the biblical account of creation should be understood figuratively.
In particular because of the development of a large number of reliable radiometric dating methods since the beginning of the 20th century, young earth creationism is now completely rejected as a scientifically serious hypothesis. These include, for example, various independent radiometric dating methods , which result in a much higher age, or dendrochronology . For instance, the so-called Hohenheim curve of dendrochronology, which now continuously until 14,600 years before present goes back (in 2009), neither with the young earth creationism nor with a gap creationism ( gap creationism designated) mix of young-earth To reconcile creationism and old-earth creationism (short-term creationism and long-term creationism ).
Renaissance in the religious environment
With the rise of Christian fundamentalism at the beginning of the 20th century, a new interest in young earth creationism arose. In 1923 wrote Seventh-day Adventist George McCready Price , the book The New Geology (The new geology) to give a fundamentalist response to the geology. The inspiration for this book came in part from Patriarchs and Prophets , a book by Ellen G. White , a co-founder of the Seventh-day Adventists, in which she describes the disastrous effects of the Flood on the shape of the earth's surface.
Price's work was taken up and expanded by Henry M. Morris and John C. Whitcomb . In 1961 they published the book The Genesis Flood . Morris and Whitcomb argued that the earth was geologically young and that most of the geological layers were deposited over the course of a year. (This is precisely the view that Buckland had rejected 130 years earlier.) Building on this, they said, “The last refuge of evolution is disappearing and the record of the stones becomes a tremendous testimony ... to the holiness and justice and power of the living God Creation ”.
This became the basis of a new generation of creationists organized around the Institute for Creation Research founded by Morris . Sister organization such as For example, the Creation Research Society , which operates as a mission organization , is trying to reinterpret the geological formations from the point of view of young earth creationism.
Morris' thoughts had a great influence on creationism and fundamentalist Christianity. With financial support from wealthy conservative organizations and private individuals, his teaching, which he called "creationist science," was widely disseminated both inside and outside the United States. His books have been translated into at least 10 languages.
However, the renaissance of young earth creationism had no significant impact on modern science. Creationism is rejected by the vast majority of scientists and, as far as it is scientific, is classified as not serious. However, he had a significant impact on education, especially in the United States, where there are repeated major disputes over whether the views of Young Earth Creationists should be taught in public schools.
The influence of young earth creationism is limited to fundamentalist Protestant churches. Almost all other Christian denominations reject the concepts of young earth creationism. Many theologians believe that the Genesis account of creation should not be taken literally.
Characteristic of young earth creationism
Young earth creationists are often Orthodox Jews or evangelical Christians who view the creation account from Genesis as a historically accurate and mostly also an infallible factual account.
The defining quality of this variant of creationism is the perception that the earth is “young”, on the order of 6,000 to 10,000 years. (For comparison: the usual age of the earth is 4.5 billion years.) This age is derived from the genealogical data of the 1st book of Moses and other dates of the Bible . The calculation is similar to the system established by the Irish Archbishop James Ussher (1581–1656), who put creation on the year 4004 BC. Chr. Dated.
Young earth creationists believe that life on earth was created by God in the course of 6 days of creation of 24 hours each in the form of basic types or defined types (“according to their type”). They also believe that the biblical account of the Flood is historically true, and that a global flood approximately 4,500 years ago destroyed all life on earth except for those who were saved in Noah's Ark .
Young Earth creationists contradict the theory of evolution as well as many theories in other scientific fields such as physics, chemistry, astronomy and geology: They reject the values of absolute physical and chemical dating methods as unreliable. You can see the geologically essential shape of today's surface of the earth as a result of catastrophes such as the flood. They also reject the random development of planets, the solar system or the universe. For linguistics , they postulated the creation of all languages through the confusion of Babel ( Babelism ). Neanderthals see them as specimens of the present-day man at a particularly old age and suspect errors in dating methods for fossil finds older than 5000 to 6000 years. In particular, they consider no explanation of the origin of the world, which God, as the creator of the universe, life and species described in the Bible, replaces with processes that can be understood purely by natural science, as possible.
They are of the opinion that naturalism and actualism (uniformitarianism) as a basic scientific principle are unsuitable for describing the world (completely). The supporters of the thesis believe that the scientific (especially the geological) data and individual geological paradoxes (see paradox of the weak young sun ) can be better explained with the assumption of a young earth and a singular catastrophism in relation to the Flood.
dinosaur
Young earth creationists contradict the scientific knowledge that the dinosaurs became extinct 65 million years ago, since the earth is only about 6,000 years old. Therefore, in circles of Young Earth creationists the theory is advocated that the dinosaurs drowned in the Flood.
In the 1961 book The Genesis Flood by Henry M. Morris, the theory was put forward that dinosaurs and humans lived together before the Flood. This view is represented in several creationist museums (such as the Creation Museum or the Creation Evidence Museum ). Another theory is that dinosaurs survived the Flood and continued to exist as dragons. Some Christians believe that the Bible has already mentioned dinosaurs. A monster named “ Behemoth ” (Job 40: 15–24) is mentioned in the Bible . Some creationists see the leviathan as a reference to dinosaurs. Some creationists suggest that dinosaurs survived in Australia and that Aboriginal people reported about them. On the Answers in Genesis website , Kenneth “Ken” Ham argues that dinosaurs were on Noah's ark and only later became extinct because they ran out of food. Dinosaurs could have been the dragons ancient stories tell of.
Theological Aspects
Essential contributions to the modern theological understanding of geology, paleontology and anthropology come from the Jesuit, geologist and anthropologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin . Teilhard's writings were in great conflict with church authorities during his lifetime, but were posthumously sold in millions and also found increasing recognition within the church. He did not see creation as something "once" closed, but as an ongoing process that is in no way in conflict with evolution. His considerations on the evolution of man, especially with regard to his intellectual and spiritual aspects, coincide in some aspects with the Indian philosopher Aurobindo Ghose , who regards the human being currently living as a transitional being to a higher level of development.
These views are not shared by the mostly evangelical young earth creationists. According to their understanding of the Bible , 1 Mos 1,1-10 EU is not understood as a myth, but as a factual report. You do this u. a. at the following points:
- The form of this passage from the Bible corresponds to a reporting style in which historical facts are also described in other parts of the Bible.
- The creation account is taken as a fact later in the Bible. In particular, Jesus himself referred to creation ( Mark 10.6 EU ) and the flood ( Matthew 24.37 EU ) and thus confirmed them as truth.
- You see in 2 Petr 3,1–7 EU (especially verse 5) a fulfilled prophecy that people in later times would no longer believe in the flood.
Strict Christian creationists also point out that, according to the Bible, death only came into the world as a result of the sin of the first humans (e.g. Rom 5.12 EU and 1 Cor 15.21 EU ), whereas in all evolutionist varieties it did Human ancestors back to the earliest protozoa are subject to mortality.
See also
Web links
- Genesisnet - Website of the study community Word and Knowledge , main representative of Junge Erde creationism in Germany
- Answers in Genesis (from Answers in Genesis , main exponent of young earth creationism in the USA; English)
- The Age of the Earth FAQs (Creationism- critical page of the Talk.origins newsgroup ; English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Studium Generale "The Hohenheim Tree Ring Calendar - 14,600 Years of the Environment and Climate Archives from Central Europe"
- ↑ Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (English WP)
- ↑ Ronald L. Numbers: The creationist . University of California Press, Berkeley 1993, ISBN 0-520-08393-8 , pp. 79-81.
- ↑ Article in the mirror
- ^ Dinosaurs and the Bible . Clarifying Christianity '. 2005. Retrieved March 14, 2007.
- ↑ claim CH711.1: Leviathan as a dinosaur . TalkOrigins Archive . Retrieved March 14, 2007.
- ^ Dinosaurs were on Noah's Ark: US museum . ABC News (Australia). Retrieved November 6, 2007.
- ↑ Rebecca Driver: Australia's Aborigines ... did they see dinosaurs? . In: Answers in Genesis (Ed.): Creation . 21, No. 1, August. Retrieved March 14, 2007.
- ^ Dinosaurs and the Bible - Answers in Genesis