how old is the earth?

Question

It says in the bible it took god 6 days to create the earth, he rested on the 7th day. and also i read in gods eyes 1 day is like a thousand and a thousand is like a day. So was it 6000 years to make earth, 600,000 or 6,000,000 or more.

Answer 1

You'll not find a reliable answer in ancient mythology. Based upon our best geological evidence currently available, the planet Earth is about 4.567 billion years old.

Answer 2

To the best of my knowledge there is no where in the Bible where it actually says a day to god is like a thousand years,blah blah. That is an explanation theologians came up with to help explain to followers why the Bible has been proven wrong by science so many times. Originally alot of what was used by church to help estimate lineages laid out in the Bible along with ages of many biblical figures and then adding with more verifiable written history. They kind of had a kink thrown into that when they first interacted with the chinese who had a very meticulously laid out written history that they could not disprove that went back further. Of course faith will lead you well through those times when the facts destroy your story. Then of course there's also the issue they had with Copernicus involving the Earth revolving around the sun rather than visa versa. Others followed in his foot steps and finally proved his theory to the point that it had to be accepted,of course this didn't help Giordano Bruno who was burned at the stake for promoting the Copernican model. What the Church has yet to fully explain is how if the Bible is indeed the inspired word of God how is it that God got such a basic scientific fact wrong?

Answer 3

Dear Debra L,

If we follow the time line that God has established in the Bible, we find that the earth is 13,017 years old. According to the Bible, we also have a date that seems to suggest when the end of the world will come--all this from the patterns that God has established in bringing the Gospel to the world. That date, from everything we know in the Bible to this point, seems to suggest that 2011 will be the year in which the Lord Jesus Christ will return. That day will mark the end of time (and the universe)and Judgment Day.

Answer 4

Debrah L,
I don't think that any human really knows. That is: When you apply the Gap Theory of Genesis 1:2.

I can take a Strong's Concordance and show that it can be translated that the Earth 'became a waste and desolation' is just as valid as 'null and void.' So the tradition of the translation is what is key to understanding, the Hebrew is not so exact when translated to English. The words mean more things than one. Beside, if it was dark and void, it was still there, wasn't it?

There is other scriptural evidence that shows that the world was different than it is now. That things aged less rapidly, or at least grew old less rapidly. If it was true for humans, I can see no problem in the other creatures on the Earth living longer.

All that kind of ties in together; it makes me wonder about the dating methods that are used today, perhaps they are not so accurate!

Answer 5

I don't see why God would rest, I mean, things happen easy for the guy, he's superhuman and can do anything he wants, right?

It is true however, that your entire lifetime might be only a second (time interval) in a higher power's view, or as seen from higher dimensions!

EDIT:
Dinosaurs and alligators were around 200 million years ago so it is much older than 6000 years, don't listen to the other answerers and get on http://www.wikipedia.org and research the geologic age of the earth, pronto

Answer 6

Based on extensive and detailed scientific evidence, geologists have determined the age of the Earth to be around 4.567 billion years (4.567×109 years). This age represents a compromise between the oldest-known terrestrial minerals – small crystals of zircon from the Jack Hills of Western Australia – and astronomers' and planetologists' determinations of the age of the solar system based in part on radiometric age dating of meteorite material and lunar samples.
radiometric age dating evidence from the zircons further confirms that the Earth is at least 4.404 billion years old. Comparing the mass and luminosity of the Sun to the multitudes of other stars, it appears that the solar system cannot be much older than those rocks. Ca-Al-rich inclusions (inclusions rich in calcium and aluminium) – the oldest known solid constituents within meteorites which are formed within the solar system – are 4.567 billion years old, giving an age for the solar system and an upper limit for the age of the Earth. It is assumed that the accretion of the Earth began soon after the formation of the Ca-Al-rich inclusions and the meteorites. Since the accretion time of the Earth is not exactly known yet, and the predictions from different accretion models vary between several millions up to about 100 million years, the exact age of the Earth is difficult to define.
Some recent highly controversial studies found the carbon-nitrogen-oxygen cycle to be two times slower than previously believed, leading to the conclusion that (via the CNO cycle) the Universe could be about one billion years older (roughly 14.7 billion years old) than previous estimates. [2] [3][4][5]

Answer 7

You have to look at science, not Faith, in issues that can be answered scientifically. Currently, scientific evidence suggests that the Earth is between 4.5 and 4.6 billion years old. This could change as new evidence is uncovered. New evidence usually suggests that the Earth is older, not younger.
Any way you look at it, isn’t it sufficient to acknowledge that we live on a very old and marvelously adaptive planet?
The way I look at the stories of Genesis, these were stories that were passed down to enlighten us about our relationship with God. These are important stories, well worth reading, but you can’t look to them for scientific information.
Nothing in the realm of science should shake your Faith in Christ and in the Word of God. Just look to scripture to teach you about Faith and study science to learn about science.

Answer 8

Is the bible clear about the age of the earth and universe?


God uses a relatively large amount of space in Genesis 1 to make it very clear that He created the universe in six days. There is no mention of billions-of-years or any great period of time. However, many people still wonder whether or not the modern scientific belief that the earth and universe have existed for billions of years can be harmonized with a literal interpretation of the Bible.

Most Christians have heard the argument that the word “day” in Genesis does not mean a literal 24 hour type day, but rather that the “days” represent 6 great ages of time. This is often referred to as the day-age theory. Many people have wondered whether this argument is valid. It is true, after all, that the Hebrew word for day (yom) can have several different meanings, depending upon its context. However, it is our opinion that when all the facts are gathered, it is abundantly clear that God communicated with precision that all creation took place during the time period of six, normal, 24-hour type days.

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The Hebrew word for day (yom) can have several different meanings. The meaning is always clear when read in context.
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The first reference to “day” in the creation account is in the context of a 24 hour cycle of light and dark, “And God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day” (NASV, see Genesis One).
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When the word “day” is used with a number, such as day one, day two, etc., it always refers to a literal, 24 hour type day. This is true 100% of the time. This holds true all 359 times that “day” is used with an ordinal modifier (number) outside of Genesis chapter 1.
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There is no Biblical indication that “day” is used differently in the beginning chapter of Genesis than it is throughout the rest of the book, or the rest of the Old Testament.
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The “days” in Genesis 1 are always specifically used in connection with the words “evening and morning.” This phrase is used with “day” 38 times in the Old Testament, not counting Genesis chapter 1. Each time, without exception, the phrase refers to a normal 24 hour type day. It is also important to note that this phrase is never used in the Old Testament in a manner which is obviously metaphoric.

When the phrase “evening and morning” is coupled with a numbered modifier and the word “yom”, there is no stronger way of specifying a normal day. We understand that Genesis is describing six Earth rotations, not an unspecified period of billions of years.

We see therefore that a study of the Hebrew text of Genesis 1 states in clear language that creation took place during the period of six, normal 24-hour type days. Further evidence of this conclusion is given in Exodus 20:11. This passage, written in stone by the finger of God Himself, states, “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.” God, the only witness to the creation events, testifies that all things were created within a literal six day period.

Ultimately, whether one accepts this information or not probably depends more upon their interpretation of science than of the scriptures. For without the consideration of modern scientific theories of the age of the universe, there can be little reason to question the clear communication of the Bible.

As stated by Pattle P.T. Pun, a leading progressive creationist, “It is apparent that the most straightforward understanding of the Genesis record, without regard to all of the hermeneutical considerations suggested by science, is that God created heaven and earth in six solar days, that man was created in the sixth day, that death and chaos entered the world after the fall of Adam and Eve, that all of the fossils were the result of the catastrophic universal deluge which spared only Noah's family and the animals therewith.” [Pattle P.T. Pun, “A Theology of Progressive Creationism,” Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation, Vol. 39, No. 1 (Ipswich, MA: March 1987), p. 14]

As in all areas of theology, God allows each believer to decide which side to take on a controversial topic. It must be noted, however, that the Scriptures are emphatically clear on this issue. The billions-of-years timescale estimated by modern scientific theories cannot be harmonized with the literal interpretation of the Bible by resorting to the misguided notion of a day-age.

Answer 9

Accepted scientific theory states that the Earth was formed around 4.57 billion years ago (see source)

Answer 10

It took 6, 24 hour days to make the earth and it has been around for 6,000 years give or take.