How can a bible thumpers believe in evolution?

Question

Opinion polls say most christians believe in evolution, yet the bible says the earth was created in 7 days around 6,000 yrs ago?

Do these "Luke-warm" christians know what their bible states as scientific fact?

If you "really" believe your bible you have to deny the reality of the many different, and independent, radiometric dating processes which all establish the earth is, in fact, over 4.5 billion years old.

Sorry, thumpers, can't have it both ways...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

Question and learn - the truth shall set you free! ;-)

Answer 1

Well, are you stating that if I take the literal meaning of the Bible in all circumstances, that is "really" believing my Bible? Also, are you saying that if I do not take the entirety of the Bible in a literal fashion, I am somehow a "luke-warm" Christian? If so, there would be a very large proportion of the Christian population that would not "really" believe their Bible (though I am sure their may be some fundamentalist minded folks who would agree with you).

Now I agree that if the Genesis story is taken literally, then there are some contradictions with current scientific theories. As far as I am aware, it is only Young Earth Creationists who feel that the Earth is a mere 6000 years old. Even the advocates of Intelligent Design admit to the world being older than that.

However, the spirit of your critique is somewhat correct. It would be contradictory for someone who believes that the only correct interpretation of Scripture is the purely literal one to say that they believe that the evolutionary theory was correct. It should be noted, though, that is not unheard of non-bible thumpers to take contradictory stances on issues...

Answer 2

I'm not a "Bible thumper" but I do consider myself a Christian.

I believe that the Bible is a book of stories written by men. They could write only what they knew---either because of their places in time and space or their ability to understand. Just as the believers of other religions formed rational explanations for phenomena they didn't fully understand, so did the Christians.

Nobody has ever said that the Bible is a complete history of the world.

I think that a belief in God and Creationism and a belief in evolution are not mutually exclusive, as long as you accept that every word of the Bible is not to be taken literally.

Answer 3

There are so many things to discuss here.
First of all, who cares about opinion polls. Most people, christian and non christian, are pretty ignorant and only believe what they heard without ever thinking about it for themselves or knowing why they think it. Opinion polls say most Americans think we shouldn't be in Iraq, yet most of them probably couldn't point to
THE REGION that Iraq is in on a map nor name one major faction in Iraq (Al Qaeda doesn't count).
Probably most of the people that say they are Christians haven't even read the bible and have no idea what it says (especially true of Catholics).
Next, the bible doesn't say Genesis is scientific fact. I don't think you'll find either the word "fact" nor "scientific" anywhere in the Bible (correct me if I'm wrong). The only part that even uses "scientific" language is Genesis 1:2 where it says "And God amasseth an enormous amount of hydrogen such that the gravitational pull of the mass causeth hydrogen nuclei at the center of the mass to fuseth with one another, releasing enormous amounts of nuclear energy. This He called the sun, which He promptly burneth the finger of God on. And the Lord said "That really pisseth Me off." Thus the Lord quickly formed the earth and covered it with dark waters, in which He dippeth the finger of God to cooleth it off."
Seriously now, I'm no Hebrew expert, but I believe the word for "day" and "era" are the same word in Hebrew, in which case Genesis may be interpretted as describing long period of time rather than 24 hour days. Maybe God lives in another dimension where His day passes at an extremely slow rate. Maybe one of God's days is 2 billion of our years.
Next, evolution and the age of the universe, though correlated, are 2 different things. Also there are 2 types of evolution, micro and macro. Microevolution has to do with evolution within species. We can see this when bacteria change to become resistant to drugs. It makes sense because the few bacteria that survive are resistant, so they reproduce more like themselves. All the others die and don't reproduce. This is something that can be observed because it doesn't take a billion years to happen.
Macroevolution, one species turning into another species, has not been observed (at least I dont think so). It has only been assumed based on a lot of science and some guessing. Probably the best argument for it is the similarity of DNA from one species to the next. Macroevolution DOES require billions of years. So, naturally, if you're inclined to believe in macroevolution, you want to the earth to be billions of years old.
How we can assume that radiometric dating it accurate, I dont know. How do you know the earth isn't made of something a lot older, but is, in fact, young itself? How do you know something didn't temporarily speed up it's aging? How do you know the results of radiometric dating are accurate? Obviously you can't sit around for a billion years waiting for some element to decay.

Finally, to answer your original question. The bible never says one of the requirements for being a Christian is believing the literal interpretation of the creation story. So there is no "both ways" to be had. The important part is surrendering your life to Christ...choosing the difficult (not the least of which is figuring out what the heck "surrendering to Christ" means) and narrow path that leads to abundant life. Most people dont want to do that. They want to rule their own life and live for themselves.....go on the wide and 'easy' path that leads to destruction. And because they don't want to take the narrow path, they want to show that part of the bible is wrong. Then they can dismiss the entire thing as a bunch of nonsense, be done with it and go about their lives, unfortunately, usually doing self and others destructive things.

Answer 4

There is no radio-metric dating method that can produce a date stand alone. You must tell the lab technician how old the sample is by identifying which layer it came from or which index fossil it is associated with. Then the lab technician manipulates the testing apparatus to deliver a date that falls into that time period. That is the only way they can do it. Think about that-they date it by the index fossil before the test will work. Its bogus at best. Check out what I say-you will find that all those billions of years is just speculation-nothing else. Ask a scientist.

Answer 5

God's day is longer. The people in those times didn't know what evolution was so how could they write it down. Evolution is not against the creation story. God played a key role in evolution. When God created man, he made him out of clay(would the person write down he made humans by doing some scientific thing?). When God said let there be man, the first man came onto the earth from an ape. The God made man in his image by giving him a soul which made him different from all the other animals.

Answer 6

oh yee of little capacity!
the Bible , as we have pointed out over and over and over, does not say seven literal days . Check 2Peter3:8 However, let this one fact not be escaping YOUR notice, beloved ones, that one day is with Jehovah as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.
Notice , a day is "AS A THOUSAND YEARS" not a literal day nor a thousand years, but an indefinite period that could mean up to millions of years. By saying "as a thousand years" to people that typically lived less that 60, would poetically mean "a really long time".
So even though there are chowder head "Bible Thumpers", incorrectly applying the literal to the figurative, by no means correctly, do they include those that believe God's word harmonizes with PROVEN SCIENCE.
Get it through your heads people, the seven days in Genesis are not to be taken literally. Anyone that does exposes their lack of understanding and their embrace of foolish doctrinal dogmatism.
Thereby closing the way to the truth to honest-hearted persons who genuinely want to know the truth.

Answer 7

Before the sun was created how do we know how long the universe was here. There was no day and night.
This vaste universe was here long before the earth was getting ready for mankind. God picked the right planet in the right place put in the right size moon and put a belt to protect the earth from Astroids. Maybe took billions of years.

Answer 8

You have no understanding of the bible to make such a statement.. The Bible is not a science book. The bible states NO scientific facts.

All science is from God. Thus, all science is good. But, man has been mucking itup so much that now mankind is suffering from the misuse of God's science.

I am of the Christian faith and I believe that ther is ample evidence that the animals and plants have evolved.

Mis applied science has it wrong concerning man however

for my pov on the subject you may read at"\:

http://pages.zdnet.com/mikevanauken/mikesinternetoutreach/id60.html

All honest seekers welcome

Answer 9

If they truly are Bible thumpers I can see how they would believe in what your secular polls would say. But those Christians that choose to open the Bible, read and meditate on the Word of God instead of just thumping it I do not believe are part of that poll. God said, it. I believe it and that's it!

Answer 10

How do you know the world is 4.5 billion years old. You have simply said that a rock that has clearly been around since the creation of the world (could be the day you were born, prove it) appears to have been emitting carbon for 4.5 billion years. How do you know when it started emitting such carbon.