What is Christianity's answer to ancient prehistorical facts?

Question

What is Christianity's answer for historic human documentation dating back 5000BC; or other such occurances proven to be true such as prehistoric animals, dinosaur bones from 50 million years ago, 100 million year old rocks, Egyptian hyroglifics etc..///// things which blatently contradict the Garden of Eden as the proposed beginning of the Earth a few thousand years ago?

JC I have take the liberty to answer your questions in order, but I cant afford to paste a page that long in my details section. Tell me where you want to see it

JC I answered all of your questions in order, yet I cant afford to paste that all on this details portion. Tell me where you would like to see my answer

From Jonah nine "All the Christians I know are aware of the fact that the Earth is over 4.5 Billion years old."

Ok sure. Would it be accurate for me to assume as well if I asked you to explain to me scientifically events such as the parting of the Red sea, the Great flood, the burning bush, all the way up to Jesus' ressurrection---- would you also chalk these accounts up to us ' misinterpreting' scripture too literally; or are 'all the Christians you know' just picking and choosing which portions of the Bible you personally see fit? Explain more

^^^^ I'm sorry. The above response is to CEM's comments

To this date is added the time of the sojourn in Egypt (430 years, Exodus 12:40), thereby producing the date of 1876 B.C. as the year Jacob went to Egypt (Packer, et al., 1980, p. 50). Interestingly, the Bible records Pharaoh’s query of Jacob’s age (and Jacob’s answer—130 years) in Genesis 47:9, which would make the year of Jacob’s birth 2006 B.C. (Genesis 25:26). Abraham was 100 years old when he begat Isaac, giving the date of 2166 B.C. for Abraham’s birth (Genesis 21:5; Packer, et al., 1980, p. 54). The chronology from Abraham to Adam is recorded very carefully in two separate chronological tables—Genesis 5 and 11. According to Genesis 12:4, Abraham was 75 when he left Haran, presumably after Terah died at 205 years; thus, Abraham was born when Terah was 130 years old, albeit he is mentioned first by importance when Terah began having sons at the age of 70 (Genesis 11:27; 12:4; Acts 7:4).
Having established the birth date of Abraham at 2166 B.C. (Archer, 1970, pp. 203-204)

it is possible to work from the time of Adam’s creation to Abraham in order to discern the chronology of “the beginning.” The time from the creation of Adam to Seth was 130 years (Genesis 5:3), the time from Adam to Noah was 1056 years (Packer, et al., 1980, pp. 56-57), and the time from Noah’s birth to the Flood was 600 years (Genesis 7:6), or 1656 A.A. (After Adam). It appears that Shem was about 100 years old at the time of the Flood (Genesis 5:32; 11:10) and begat Arphaxad two years after the Flood (the Earth was not dry for more than a year; cf. Genesis 7:11 with 8:14; see also Genesis 11:10) in approximately 1659 A.A.
Arphaxad begat Salah in his thirty-fifth year; however, Luke 3:36 complements the chronological table of Genesis 11 with the insertion of Cainan between Arphaxad and Salah, which indicates that likely Arphaxad was the father of Cainan. Proceeding forward, one observes that Terah was born in 1879 A.A., and bore Abraham 130 years later (in the year 2009 A.A.).

Simple arithmetic—2166 B.C. added to 2009 A.A.—would place the creation date at approximately 4175 B.C. The Great Flood, then, would have occurred around 2519 B.C. (i.e., 1656 A.A.).

Simple arithmetic—2166 B.C. added to 2009 A.A.—would place the creation date at approximately 4175 B.C. The Great Flood, then, would have occurred around 2519 B.C. (i.e., 1656 A.A.).
From Apologetic Press . Org
http://www.apologeticspress.org/rr/rr1999/r&r9908a.htm

Answer 1

The question is regarding the "100 M. yr. old rocks"; where and how are you getting these numbers? Carbon dating? If so, your question and therefore all scientific evidence based upon carbon dating due to it faulty exegesis makes it completely invalid. Your presumption is that the tool of science is correct, how can you get a correct answer from a tool that gives incorrect readings?

Prehistoric animals? What Christian has ever denied dinosaurs?? I haven't met one...apparently you may have...in your mind. Egyptian hieroglyphics? what does this have to do with anything? I have yet to meet a Christian who denies these...

How do these things IN YOUR MIND contradict the Garden of Eden? I think you must be a young kid up too late, on the computer when you should be in bed, or studying...and if you are...read a little--your lack of knowledge is astounding. If you are ignorant, that is one thing, but to show it is another.

Answer 2

Just a theory here-- but I don't think the story of the Garden as it is told, is a BAM it happened just that fast. The time measurments in the bible are clearly off from our own. Everything seems to take much longer than we think it should so when it took God 7 days to creat the earth and garden it could have been much much longer than that to us now. Also, it doesn't say that he didn't evolve his work. Like a potter doesn't just blink and have a pot; they start with a mess of clay and start molding. And when making pottery by hand, no 2 pieces are completely the same. Thats why there are a variety of people, and a vast assortment of animal and plant life here. God may have started with a tiny little cell of life and worked outward. The end result was 2 finished products (Adam and Eve) that were featured in the explanatory story. It doesn't say God did not make other people- maybe they just weren't mentioned. Consider it this way, Auto makers don't take every car they make to the show, they only take the best of what they've made. The Bible doesn't tell you everything and I don't think there'd be enough paper if it did. I agree that God created the heavens and the earth and all the beings in it but I think he created it originally to evolve and change. Look at how much it's changed just since biblical times of Jesus.
Now, thats my opinion and it's also evolving. People are free to choose what they believe in so I also respect others view points. I do my best to read between the lines.

Answer 3

Hey Mr. Airtight,
someone has fill your head with a lot of bull. Sounds like the churches might have had a go around with you. Or you have just listened to the traditions of men so long that your mind just accepts it as fact.

Well I got news for you.

You bring up the fact of historic human documentation that dates back 5000 years before Jesus Christ. I say OK to that. The Word of God go back before this.

You bring up prehistoric animals and dinosaurs bones from 50 million years ago and speak of rocks that date back 100 million years. Then you jump forward to Egypt and their hieroglyphics and say that they blatantly contradict the story we have about Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

All the Christians I know are aware of the fact that the Earth is over 4.5 Billion years old. Many of the people that are in the ditches digging for ancient finds are Christians.

So you see, you need to get out more and study your Bible daily so you too can be in the know.><>

Answer 4

Why might this hypothesis of your "blatantly contradict the backyard of Eden" while that's factually customary that prehistoric animals, dinosaur bones etc, did exist. Did it ever happen to you which you're putting Eden a sprint too on the element of in the present day's historic previous. regardless of each thing, human historic previous as all of us know it grew to become into in straight forward terms recorded as you state approximately 5000BC....while that's obvious that the little infants of God have walked upon the earth for a lots longer time than that, and all of the lesser creatures of Gods creation even hundreds of thousands of years before. Oh, by making use of the way...while Adam/Eve have been forged out of Eden, they went to stay with others.....

Answer 5

What's the question?
The largest Christian denomination on earth openly advocates evolution as official policy, and interprets the Genesis account as an allegory. The first mention of the creation in Christian theology (back in the 2nd century) already treated it allegorically, and that was the dominant opinion throughout Christian history. The first known scholars to suggest the theory of evolution were Christian theologians of the Byzantine Empire.
Don't assume that the 5% of Christians who advocate Intelligent Design are speaking for Christianity as a whole.

Answer 6

The oldest written documents date to 3400 BC.

From 3400-2800 BC, writing was used for trade and business administration only.

From 2800-2600 BC, literature is extremely rare and is ALWAYS limited to 50 words or less.

The first real literary boom produced documents like those in Genesis, the same legends, same vocabulary, and same details in some stories.

In 2100 BC, a story appeared that was inspired by Genesis 2-3, demonstrating that the Bible's version is older.

(Is that enough, or do you need more?)

Answer 7

what is to say ,clearly wehave had indiginant tribes for hundreds of thousands of years
so we are using the history of a jewish tribe ,that has been egsistant 6000
indian histry 8000
chinese history going back 20 ,000
aborgonal going back 60,000 years
we have writen texts going back in time
is now yet now
how do we know the now when adam and eve was written
or whemn noah was ''the last jew alive''
you talk of documentation going back to 5ooo bc
try cave paintings
there are /were other groups that noah didnt know
this is the fables of the jew ,as jesus was/is a jew christians repect his heritage ,teachings and new testimant of man to god the father
love god
love neighbour
so what how old so what
its the link to jesus and through the son to the father
god

Answer 8

Christianity, first of all, is a faith based upon the historical events of mankind. There is no archaeological fact that controverts its historical reliability till this day.

Higher criticism had presented many facts that seemed to point towards the unreliability of the Bible, however, with recent findings, these arguments had been refuted one by one.

Of course, there are many questions that baffles our mind still, however, given the track record of the Bible's historical reliability, I think it is only fair that we engage these questions with the benefit of the doubt in mind.

First of all, the Bible does record the existence of dinosaurs. Reading the Bible carefully, you will realize that no living creature matches the descriptions of behemoth and Leviathan. However, if you grab your kid’s dinosaur book, you will notice several possible matches for each one. Unlike other cultures, the divinely inspired authors gave accurate descriptions with, upon investigation with recent findings of dinosaur remains, almost no mythical elaborations at all. Read Job 40:15-24

Secondly, Radiometric (radioactive) dating does not yield results that are as consistent as many books would have you believe. For example, Potassium-Argon and Argon-Argon dating (tests used for dating volcanic rock) rely on the assumption that no radiogenic Argon exists in the rocks when they form—an assumption that is not true. With no consistent starting point or “zero age,” the rock ages reported by the test can vary dramatically, (depending on the amount of radiogenic Argon they started with).

There is another radioactive dating method called “fission track dating,” so named because the decay of Uranium 238 creates a minor disruption in the material that scientists call a “track.” Unfortunately, it has results that differ from the other radiometric methods. For example, a rock in Nigeria dated 95 million years old with Potassium-Argon dating, and 750 million years old using Uranium-Helium dating measured only 30 million years old with fission track dating. Do you see how the scientist could control the age reported for the geologic layer by specifying the test method?

There is one documented case where a single lump of tuff (a type of porous rock) contained components which individually dated at 1.87 million years, 25 million years, and 500 million years old. Now ask yourself, if you can get such large discrepancies within a single lump, how accurately do you believe that these testing methods define the ages of layers of the earth where fossils are found?

Yes, there is a “more accurate” radioactive dating method available called “isochron dating.” You can get an overview of isochron dating by clicking on this sentence. This dating technique does have a problem, though. It is designed to measure times on the order of a billion (1,000,000,000) years or more. Therefore everything you measure with this dating technique will seem to have great age.

For example, if you wanted to measure the distance between Los Angeles and New York, you could fly a jet airplane at a constant speed and measure the time the flight takes. Knowing the speed and time, you can calculate the distance. Now, what would happen if you used the same technique to measure the length of a house you flew over on the way to New York? It would give you bad results because you could not measure the time it took to fly over the house accurately enough to get a good answer. The same is true if you use isochron dating to measure something that is only a few thousand years old.

Another problem arises when you submit a sample for testing. Because of the variations that we just mentioned, the people operating the equipment will ask you for an estimated age of the item—before they run the test. This is true of both radiometric dating (used for igneous rock) and Carbon 14 dating (used for things that were once living).

Did you notice what happened? The scientist biased the results by determining the desired result before starting. Then, they chose a method that will give them the results they expect. This is not correct scientific procedure. How would you like it if the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) evaluated products only after they predicted the results?

So these "facts" that science offers has many presuppositions. It has set out to prove what it wanted to prove all along. For academics who preach an open mind, they have incredibly narrow minds isn't it?

When did the Bible say that Eden is the beginning of the Earth? Read Genesis 1. God started working on Earth when Earth already existed. So how can the beginning of the earth equate to the beginning of Eden? See, this are misconceptions about Christianity, sadly, many Christians are the perpetrators of these false beliefs due to their misunderstanding.

I'm unable to answer the part on Egyptian Hieroglyphics because I do not see why it contradicts the Bible. Care to elaborate more on this, so that I may look for the answer? However, many expert linguists can prove that the world's languages can be traced to one source, pointing to the evidence that once upon a time, all humans had the same language. This sheds light upon the possible reliability of the Tower of Babel story in the Book of Genesis.

Proving the Bible reliable is not easy and certainly cannot be based on only a few points. Rather it is the cumulative evidence spread over a spectrum of subjects and cross-examinations that it is able to survive in it's earliest form even after so many years.

This is the answer I gave to a similar question u had posted. I did it hear any replies from u, and instead of conversing your thoughts with us, u have started another similar thread.

Seems like u are not looking for answers but rather, are trying to prove what u had set out to prove. Shows a lot about ur character my friend, masking narrow-mindedness in a facade of open-mindedness.

Answer 9

Dinosaur and Human Fossils Together
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/dino-fossils.htm

Answer 10

They just tend to ignore these things and hope they will go away