Fifteen
Billion Years,
More
or Less
Dr. Gerald Schroder caught our attention recently. He speaks to tour groups in Israel. Schroder is an MIT professor. His claim to front-page status has been based on the proposition that the six days of creation and the 15 billion years found by cosmologists in studying the universe are the same.
Understandably, such a pronouncement was found to bring some people up fighting from their chairs, and for others resolve doubts that have been resident for a lifetime.
Readers are forced to accept or reject the coordination between science and the scriptures.
Schroder points out that Psalms 105:8 states: "He has remembered his covenant, for even the words which he commanded to 1,000 generations." The covenant is identified as the psalm goes on. It concerns the giving of the land to Israel. The covenant was delivered to Moses along with the rest of the Pentateuch.
But there are only 26 generations between Adam and Moses. There are 10 generations from Adam to Noah, 10 generations from Noah to Abraham, and six generations from Abraham to Moses. This count has prompted scientists to ask, Where are the missing 974 generations?
Another three dozen generations can be added to bring the sequence up to the present—not much of a dent in 974 generations.
In any case, here are Schroder’s calculations:
974 generations x 40 years = 38,960 years.
Psalm 94 points out that to the Lord, a day is like 1,000 years. Peter makes the same statement in the New Testament.
Multiplying 38,960 years by 365 days to get close to 15 million years, and then calculating 1,000 years for each of these days, he concluded that there would be 15 billion years before the appearance of the human form.
The calculation expressed here was, in fact, made by Jewish sages 1,000 years ago, long before scientists fixed their sights on the 15 billion years figure. They had no way of knowing that the age of science would line up with their dead reckoning.
From Opinion, Acres USA, March 2000
(www.acresusa.com)
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Last update: August 10, 2000