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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Shift6 (talk | contribs) at 03:22, 18 July 2008 (→‎Unreferenced article: more). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Old section

I reorganized the external links to bundle the "pro" gap theory together and the "other views" together. Also added a couple links and included William Buckland's name up with Thomas Chalmers, since Buckland wrote a treatise on gap theory in 1820. In a sense, that makes him as much a "founder" as Chalmers. --shift6 17:32, 26 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Explanation of recent minor edits:

  • It is probably wrong to say that one version or the other is held by "most" Gap Creationists as I doubt that there is any definitive proof either way and what is factual is that there are varying beliefs and varying numbers of adherents to them, so I replaced "most" with "many" in that context.
  • The passages cited by many in both the Testaments as describing the fall of Satan are very controversial as to what they really mean, even within conservative groups, so I have reworded that to state that these passages are viewed by some as describing the fall of Satan.
  • I don't think that one can truly be said to be in Dispensationalism, as it is a set of beliefs, not a separate religion or church, so rather than in it one can be a believer in it or an adherent of it or to it.

These are perhaps minor points but come out of a desire to make the article both factually accurate and as NPOV-oriented as possible. Rlquall 15:08, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)

While I agree with your first two points, I believe that your third point is an example of trying to define words too narrowly. Looking up the preposition "in", I have found examples listed that substantiate the use of "someone being in Disipensationalism" as proper. Of course, the alternatives you suggested are also appropriate, so I'm cool with your changes. Woodburn 13:02, Nov 18, 2004 (EST)

As a gap theory believer myself, I have another belief that is not included here. I believe in the gap theory for various reasons, but one of them is not so there would be time to "build up the fossil record". I am not saying that this belief should be removed from this article, but someone should add that just as God created a full grown (mature) man and woman, He could have also created a mature universe and planet, one that would appear to science to have existed for billions of years (for the universe) and a planet with a "full" fossil record.


I believe the Gen. 1:1 and 1:2 gap is uncontrovertably the most prevalent flavor of this belief. The New Testament genealogy of Jesus in Luke doesn't really admit of a post-Adamic gap, the "one approach" previously emphasized in this article. I have revised the second paragraph of the "Rationale" section to reflect the "pre-re-creation" gap as the highlighted "one approach" since doctrinal consistency would require adherents to assert the belief that human history must have started with Adam. Otherwise, they would be trading a belief in the accuracy of Genesis for a belief in the accuracy of the gospel of Luke, which certainly isn't very likely for the dispensationalist Christians who are the primary advocates of "gap creationism".

Not sure if this is technically Gap creationism, but it is related. There is a theory/opinion that the genealogies in Genesis contain an incorrect translation. Specifically, followers of this theory claim the hebrew word translated as fathered, or was the father of, can be translated just as accurately as "was the ancestor of". They use this difference to explain the gap between the Old Earth, and yet small totals of years. I will see if I can find a documented version of this to link to.Christonjp 21:48, 1 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Unreferenced article

The original article was completely unreferenced, had had a lead that failed to explain what Gap creationism is. I am therefore moving it here (per WP:V) and replacing with a referenced stub that does explain what it is, and can serve as the basis for, and a lead of, an improved article. If you want to move any of this back into mainspace, please find sources to verify it, per WP:PROVEIT.

Likewise most of the ELs don't seem to meet WP:EL so they're likewise moving here. If you can demonstrate that any of the represent prominent GC views, or extensive GC information, they can go back in. HrafnTalkStalk 18:36, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Seems fair. I felt the article had begun to take on the character of a discussion between opposing sides, rather than an encyclopedic statement of facts. TO that end, I began a new re-write. I salvaged some of the previous article (as saved below) just because it had been developed over time and discussion, but focused on adding references inline with the text rather than as misc links at the end of the article. I'd like to add more, but a little bit at a time to avoid the article becoming what it was before. --shift6 (talk) 05:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I basically reverted most of your new edits (although I did add cites in most cases). Your concerns about verifiability are unjustified in almost every one of your revision summaries. A wiki article can say "many people claim X" and cite self-published books of people claiming X. It has nothing to do with whether or not X itself is true. We are not verifying X, we are verifying that many people claim X. WP:V states: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth — that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true." And since we are talking about a belief system, who is to say whether any person is telling the truth?
Further, I don't agree with your delete-by-swath method of editing the article. For instance, you deleted an entire section claiming that specific sources should be cited for specific claims. Link to that WP policy or guideline or heck even an essay, please? The intro sentence to that section clearly indicates that it is a short summary list of support given by various sources, and includes those sources in one group at the beginning. This is perfectly legitimate. You again also claimed that the sources aren't reliable, but again since the text reads that "people who believe X support it with Y", we don't get to judge the truth of X or Y, we only need to provide a citation of this support.
I delete a big chunk of near-plagiarism too. Anyway, hope this all makes sense. --shift6 (talk) 03:22, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Old lead

Gap creationism, also called Restitution creationism or Ruin-Reconstruction, is a term used to describe a particular set of Christian beliefs about the creation of the Universe and the origin of man. The concept of the Gap Theory is widely thought to have been promulgated by William Buckland and Thomas Chalmers in the early 1800s, though some adherents maintain that it can be traced back to biblical times. Certainly it became quite popular when it was promoted by the Scofield Reference Bible in 1909.

Rationale

Gap creationists believe that science has proven beyond reasonable doubt that the Earth is in fact far older than can be accounted for by merely adding up the ages of Biblical patriarchs, as given in the Book of Genesis. By using this approach, Young Earth creationists derive the age of the Earth to be approximately 6,000 – 10,000 years.

However, in order to maintain that the Genesis account is inerrant in matters of scientific fact, which includes accepting that the Earth is extremely ancient, Old Earth creationists suppose that certain facts about both the human past and the age of the Earth have been omitted from the Biblical account rather than mythologized by it. The "Gap creationism" explanation of this position is to state that sometime before the Fall of Man, there must have been a "gap" in the Biblical account that lasted perhaps tens of thousands or even millions or billions of years.

A revised theory proposes that time in its current measurable form didn't exist prior to the Fall of Adam and Eve. God and all spiritual beings exist outside of time, therefore time is irrelevant. In this environment, the matter of whether the universe was created in one second or over several billions of years is immaterial; also, the principles of physics were optimal - for example, the speed of light was infinite. Some adherents to this revision also believe that the universe was created considerably smaller and subsequently grew after an immense conflict between Satan and Michael (archangel), which resulted in the signs of a universal cataclysm, which the non-theistic scientific community interprets as evidence for a Big Bang. The Earth may have pre-existed this event or may have arisen from it, but in both cases was left empty and desolated, and was selected for recreation. In this revised theory, mankind is created by God to take the role of spiritual partnership that was formerly occupied by Lucifer, and intended to re-establish God's intended order throughout the regenerated universe as part of an ongoing creative process. Only in such a capacity, can the general state of decay beyond the earth, and throughout the cosmos, be attributed to the Fall of Adam and Eve.

However, not all adherents of the Gap Theory accept that the scientific geological record refers to the gap between initial creation and regeneration, preferring instead to rely on the Biblical flood as a sufficient explanation for the mass extinction of many groups and classifications of creatures, including the dinosaurs, and geologic upheaval resulting in what could be misinterpreted as an old earth.

Varieties

Between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2

The most common variety of "gap theory" assumes that a chronological gap occurs between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2, during which vast spans of geologic time are presumed to have elapsed. It is thus postulated that the Earth was initially created in the distant past, and that all geologic events pointing to an old Earth transpired before some event that reduced the Earth to a state of formlessness or chaos as described in Genesis 1:2. This interpretation views Genesis 1:1-2 as best translated thus:

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
--gap occurs here--
Now the earth became formless and void (or waste and ruin)..."

One suggested explanation for the event that throws the Earth into chaos is the fall of Lucifer (Satan). (Revelation 12:7–12, Isaiah 14:12, Ezekiel 28, Luke 10:18)

Those who hold this viewpoint on when the gap occurred point out that the "clock" on the six days of Genesis 1 may not have started "ticking" until the emergence of light in Genesis 1:3 as that verse indicates that this was the evening and morning that make the first day of Genesis, and light had to be present to initiate an evening.

The viewpoint that a gap took place between verses 1 and 2 implies that the events during the six days of Genesis 1 were an act of re-creation (restoration of the Earth) rather than initial creation, explaining why Gap creationism is sometimes called "Ruin-Restoration", and is part of the ideas held by some adherents of Dispensationalism as recorded by Rev. Clarence Larkin in his book Dispensational Truth. One of the stronger arguments for support of this viewpoint is found within the wording of Genesis 1:2 which states that the planet earth was already a physical entity covered in waters and existing in space-time before God said "...let there be light" in Genesis 1:3.

Although the Bible gives no specific time for the interval between the initial creation (Genesis 1:1) and the start of the regeneration (Genesis 1:3), some Old Earth creationists see it as being merely thousands of years at the most on the basis that "a day with the Lord is as a thousand years and a thousand years as a day" (see: Day-Age Creationism), while the majority of others feel that it must be considerably longer than that to account for the scientific geological record; this Old Earth Creationist view is at considerable variance with the Young Earth Creationist view, although both doctrinal schools are found within Christian fundamentalism.

Between Genesis 2 and 3

Some Gap Creationists postulate that a gap occurs between the seventh day, the one of rest, and the account of the Fall of Adam and Eve and hence that of Mankind through the agency of the temptation of Satan in the form of a snake. According to this theory, this amount of time would be sufficient for all of the geologic events which have happened to make the appearance of the Earth to be quite old.

Supporting scriptures

In contradistinction with other Old Earth creationists, Gap creationisms generally agree with the account of six literal 24-hour days as given in Genesis, and that everything done during this six day period was "very good". However, there are a number of scriptures which adherents contend support the Ruin-Reconstruction theory of an earth existing prior to this six day event.

  • God is light and cannot create anything in a less than perfect state, so a newly created earth from the hand of God shouldn't have been without form and void, and shrouded in darkness. Deuteronomy 32:4, Isaiah 45:18 1 John 1:5
  • Angels already existed when God "laid the foundations of the Earth", so there had been at least one creative act of God before this. Job 38:4–7
  • Satan had fallen from grace "in the beginning". A state of sin in the universe, but not yet in mankind, is demonstrated by the serpent's temptation of Adam and Eve to sin before they were actually corrupted by sin. Ezekiel 28:11–19, John 8:44
  • Related to all of this is the fact that space, time, water, and the rock and metal which constitutes the main body of the earth existed in Genesis 1:2 before the period of six days began. In fact, the Bible doesn't discuss details on the creation of the body of the earth at all; beginning in verse 3, Genesis 1 only discusses the surface of the planet.

These scriptures are cited by supporters of Gap creationism without an appeal to scientific or secular investigations. Gap creationists do not necessarily agree with theories given by science, including the Big Bang and Evolution and others. In fact, a gap creationist may believe that the earth is only 6,000-10,000 years old; ie. that the "gap" was of a very short duration. The contention is simply that Scripture records the Genesis account to be a reconstruction of an existing earth.

Criticisms

Ruin-Restoration theorists contend that Genesis 1:2 is correctly translated "became without form and void" instead of "was without form and void". Critics argue that the rendering "became" requires the Hebrew idiom "to be" and the preposition "to" (Hebrew le). They also argue that the waw disjunctive grammar means that it is a parenthetical statement describing the earth as it was first created; the translation "became" would have used the waw consecutive, describing the next event in a sequence. However, many treatises have been written by Hebrew scholars supporting both sides of this translation, which means this issue cannot be clearly resolved.

In addition, the argument that the light had to be present to initiate an evening (Genesis 1:3) requires restricting the meaning of the Hebrew word "evening" (עֶרֶב) more narrowly than the Hebrew demands. While the word frequently is equivalent to the English word evening — the period of time near sunset — at times it refers instead to the entire night when no light from the sun is visible. For example, in Job 7:4 the same Hebrew word is used and clearly refers to all of the night (which is how virtually all translations render it). In the passage in question (Genesis 1:5), "evening" and "morning" are said to constitute an entire day. Thus, the context strongly suggests that "evening" was meant to refer to "night" (the period of dark); and "morning", to "day" (the period of light).

Gap theorists also contend that the King James Version (KJV) translation of Genesis 1:28 of "replenish the earth" means to "refill". However, when the KJV was translated in 1611, "replenish" meant "to fill completely" (cf. replete), which is what the Hebrew word male meant. On the other hand, the exact same Hebrew word is used in Genesis 9:1 when God commands Noah and his sons to "fill the earth", in which case they were clearly re-populating the Earth after the Flood.

Critics argue that the finished creation was described as "very good", which they claim is incompatible with the Fall of Satan and a destructive "Lucifer Flood" that destroyed the alleged previous creation. Gap Theorists may contend that there is no declaration that all finished creation was described as "very good", but that each of the six individual days ends with God's approval, except for day two (Genesis 1:6–8). Furthermore, a Gap Theorist may point out that the things which were rebuilt during the six days of Genesis were "very good", and that this does not conflict with a Satanic fall before the first day in a Genesis 1:1-2 gap.

The long-age interpretation of the fossil record shows human and animal death before Adam. Scripture teaches that death is "the last enemy" (1 Corinthians 15:26) resulting from Adam's Fall (Genesis 3:17, Romans 5:12–19, 1 Corinthians 15:21–22). A gap theorist may first ask why this supports any particular creation account over another, as death may be the "last enemy" whether it began with Adam and Eve or before. He may also respond that 1 Corinthians 15:26 says that death is the last enemy to be destroyed, not that it is the last enemy in a chronological sense. Finally, he would contend that physical death is not the type of death referred to in the cited New Testament passages, a conclusion reached in the final bullet point of the Supporting Scriptures section above.

However, it is worth pointing out that not all adherents of the theory hold that the fossil record arises from the "gap" period, nor believe that physical death existed before the Fall of Adam and Eve (preferring instead to explain mass extinction as a result of Biblical flood.) There are many variations on the details of Gap creationism.

Other creationist views

[End of removed, unreferenced, material. HrafnTalkStalk 18:36, 1 June 2008 (UTC) ][reply]

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