                   |
What
is the Expanse in Genesis 1?
Genesis 1:6-8, 14-19.
English translations: The King James Version translates the Hebrew noun raqiya (7549) as "firmament." This translation actually comes from Jerome's Latin Vulgate "firmamentum," which conveys the idea of something firm. Jonathan Sarfati, in his book, The Genesis Account, referred to A. S. Kuliovsky, who stated that "The Hebrew word raqiya refers to something flexible or malleable which has been stretched out." 1 Sarfati prefers the translation "expanse," which is used by the NASB. Sarfati has a section in his book entitled, "God Stretched Out the Heavens." 2 In this section he identifies 17 verses that speak of the heavens being stretched out. Many of these verses employ the Hebrew verb natah (5186): Job 9:8; Psalm 104:2; Isa. 40:22; 42:5; 44:24; 45:12; 51:13; Jer. 10:12; 51:15; Zech. 12:1. Two of the verses employ the Hebrew verb raqa (7554), "...to spread out" (excerpted from Accordance): Job 37:18; Isa. 44:24b. This verb is closely related to the Hebrew noun raqiya (7549). I concur with Sarfati and NASB that "expanse" is the best translation of raqiya (7549). The
Uses of raqiya in Genesis 1.
THE INITIAL OCCURRENCE OF RAQIYA. Genesis 1:6-8. We have already concluded that this noun means "a stretched out space of indeterminate size." The best one-word translation is "expanse." This noun appears five times in the space of three verses in this section of the Creation Account. Let us analyze it. The location of the raqiya: "in the midst of the waters." We read, in Genesis 1:6a, Then God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters ...." So, in the first appearance of this noun, we learn that God's intention was to place an expanse – a stretched out space – in the midst of the waters. It would divide the waters. But which waters? So far in the text, we do not know. But more information is coming. The purpose of the raqiya: "and let it separate the waters from the waters." Genesis 1:6b informs us that the purpose of the raqiya was separation of the waters. But we as readers are still in the dark as to which waters the author of Genesis is referring. But the action of God in the next verse more clearly defines the nature of the separation. The nature of the separation. Genesis 1:7. "God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so." So, we learn that God created the raqiya specifically to separate the waters which were below the raqiya from the waters which were above it. We surmise that the waters which were below the raqiya were the waters of the ocean that already covered the entire surface of the globe before the start of the Second Day (Gen. 1:2; 9). We surmise, further, that the waters which were above the raqiya served as some kind of water vapor canopy or ethereal "protective blanket" that had a beneficial impact upon the earth below. One thing we can deduce for certain. For centuries, there was enough water in "the waters above the expanse" to produce a constant deluge of rain over the entire earth for forty days and forty nights during Noah's Great Flood (Genesis 7:4, 12). That is a prodigious amount of water that had been protecting the earth and its inhabitants from above. There was a completely different meteorological system before the Flood than there was after the Flood, a fact which we will demonstrate shortly. If it be argued that the opening of the windows of the heavens (Genesis 7:11) was simply rain descending from the clouds exactly as it happens today, I strongly object. There is simply not enough rain in today's clouds to cascade down from above upon the entire globe over a space of forty days and forty nights. The "waters above the expanse" did not consist of rain from clouds. The first occurrences of "cloud" ('anan, 6051) do not appear in the text of Genesis until after the Flood, in Genesis 9:13, 14, 16). The forty days and forty nights of rain came from the condensation of the global water vapor canopy, not from any clouds, for no clouds yet existed. A further identification of the raqiya. Genesis 1:8. "God called the expanse heavens (the plural noun shamayim, 8064) (JTB Translation). And there was evening and there was morning, a second day." Why did Moses, under the tutelage of God, further identify the singular raqiya as the plural "heavens"? First of all, because there are multiple heavens. Today, there is the heaven in which birds and bats fly. Then there is the heaven in which the sun, moon, and stars navigate. There there is the highest heaven, the abode of God. Second, and this is an interpretation which I have heard no other scholar employ, because there were, at the completion of creation, two distinct raqiyas. The lower raqiya was created on the Second Day of Creation. It was the "Raqiya of the Waters" (Gen. 1:6-8). The upper raqiya was mentioned on the Fourth Day of Creation. It is the "Raqiya of the Heavens," housing the sun, moon, and stars (Gen. 1:14, 15, 17). During the first 1500 years of human existence, one could look upward and peer through the Lower Raqiya of the Waters and up into the Upper Raqiya of the Heavens, and never know there were two distinct, but overlapping Raqiyas. They were indistinguishable. But they were both there. Today, we have a lower atmosphere, and then we have Deep Space in which the sun, moon, and stars circle. But we cannot discern the difference from the earth. But, since the Flood of Noah upon the Earth, the Raqiya of the Waters has been missing. There is no longer any water vapor canopy. THE SECOND OCCURRENCE OF RAQIYA. Genesis 1:14-19. God's command: 14 Then God said, “Let there be lights The location of the lights: in the expanse of the heavens The functional purpose of the lights: to separate the day from the night, The time purpose of the lights: and let them be for signs
and for seasons
and for days and years; The luminary
value of the lights: 15 and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to
give light on the earth”;
The result of God's command: and it was so. The specificity of the lights: The Great Lights: 16 God made the two great lights, The Greater
Light (the sun): the greater light to govern the day,
The Lesser Light (the moon): and the lesser light to govern the night; The
Distant Lights: He made the stars also. (Literally, "and the
stars."
There is no pronoun "He" or verb "made" in the Hebrew text. Contrary to
modern secular cosmology, which believes that the main feature of the
heavens is the stars, in God's assessment, the stars are almost an
afterthought.)
The location of God's placement of the
lights:17 God placed them in the
expanse of the heavens
The repetition of God's purpose for the lights: to give light on the earth, 18 and to govern the day and the night,
and to separate the light from the darkness; God's assessment of His luminary creation on the Fourth Day: and God saw that it was good. The passage of time on the Fourth Day: 19 There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day. Some Observations are in Order
1. There are two distinct raqiyas in Genesis 1. a. There is the Raqiya of the Waters described in
Genesis 1:6-8
2. The vocabulary of the
two raqiyas is different.(1) "Let there be an expanse in the midst
of the waters" (Gen. 1:6).
(2) "and let it separate the waters from the waters" (Gen. 1:6) (3) "God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so. (4) God called the expanse "heavens" (JTB's plural translation of the plural Hebrew noun shamayim [8064]). b. There is the Raqiya of the Heavens described in Genesis 1:14-19 (1) Then God said, “Let there be lights
in the expanse of the heavens ...." (Gen. 1:14)
(2) "... and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. (Gen. 1:15) (3) "God placed them [the two great lights] in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth ...." (Gen. 1:17). a. The Raqiya of the Waters (Gen. 1:6-8) is
repeatedly associated with the plural noun "waters" (mayim, 4325).
(1) Gen. 1:6 (three
occurrences)
(2) Gen. 1:7 (two occurrences) b. The Raqiya of the Heavens (Gen. 1:14-19) is
repeatedly associated with
(1) the plural noun "heavens" (shamayim, 8064) (Gen. 1:14, 15, 17),
(2) with the noun light or lights (ma'or, 3974), appearing both in the plural (Gen. 1:14, 15, 16) and in the singular (Gen. 1:16 - twice), (3) and with the Hiphil Infinitive verb "to give light" (o'r, 215) (Gen. 1:15, 17). 3. The function of the two raqiyas was different. a. The function of the raqiya of the
waters was to divide or separate between two regions of waters –
the waters below the raqiya (the ocean) and the waters above the raqiya (the water
vapor canopy) (Gen. 1:6, 7).
b. The function of the raqiya of the heavens was to provide a sphere of operation for celestial lights: (1) to separate between the day and the
night, the light and the darkness (Gen. 1:14, 18)
(2) to serve for signs, seasons, and the passage of time, including days and years (Gen. 1:14) (3) to shed light on the earth (Gen. 1:15, 17) (4) and (for the sun and the moon respectively) to govern the day and the night (Gen. 1:16, 18). 4. The Raqiya of the Waters had a distinctly beneficial effect upon the earth and its inhabitants. a.
There was a uniformly warm climate all over the globe. God created man
without fur or feathers. He was naked (Gen. 2:25). To live naked,
without clothes, was possible only if there were a uniformly warm
climate.
b. The earth was warm enough to grow a prodigious amount of vegetation all over the planet. Man and all animals were vegetarian in the beginning (Gen. 1:29-30). (1)
Without a doubt, the Global
Flood
changed everything. Huge mats of vegetation were scoured off the earth
by the Flood
and were buried in what became vast deposits of coal and
oil.
(2) With the loss of vegetation and the increase of barren deserts after the Flood, both man and many animals were forced to begin consuming meat. (3) Originally there was an amicable relationship between man and animals. When God allowed animals to start eating meat after the Flood, man would have been fair prey for animals. So God placed a fear of man upon all animals that was not there originally (Gen. 9:1-2). c. The possibility of increased atmospheric pressure. Henry M. Morris, on p. 60 of his book, The Genesis Record, explains as follows: Some
have objected to the idea of a heavy vapor canopy because of the great
increase in atmospheric pressure which it would cause at the earth's
surface. Rather than being a problem, however, this effect would
contribute still further to health and longevity. Modern biomedical
research is increasingly proving that such "hyperbaric" pressures are
very effective in combating disease and in promoting good health
generally. There should be no problem in organisms living under
high external pressures, provided their internal pressures had time to
adjust correspondingly.
This, in my view, would be one of the factors that explains the ten-fold increase in life expectancy of antediluvian populations in comparison to our present-day, dramatically-reduced postdiluvian life expectancy. d. There was a "Greenhouse" or "Terrarium" effect on the entire globe. The "Waters Above" were responsible for this beneficent climate. (1) There was no rain (Gen. 2:4-6).
(2) There were no clouds. The first mention of clouds in the Hebrew Scriptures does not occur until after the Flood (Gen. 9:13, 14, 16). (3) Because there were no clouds, there were no rainbows. The first prediction of the appearance of a rainbow was as a sign of God's Everlasting Flood Covenant with Noah and all of mankind that He would never again destroy the entire earth with a flood (Gen. 9:8-17). (4) There was no snow. (5) There were no polar ice caps. (6) There were no seasons in the sense of summer and winter, seedtime and harvest. Seasons do not appear in Scripture until after the Flood (Gen. 8:22). (7) Man's longevity, even after he sinned, was enormous! Man did not age or die until after he sinned by disobeying God's command (Gen. 2:15-17). Even after he sinned and death affected all of mankind, people typically lived for many hundreds of years (Gen. 5:1-32). Without a doubt, the Water Vapor Canopy served as a shield from harmful infrared and ultraviolet radiation. After the Water Vapor Canopy was dissipated at Noah's Flood, longevity decreased exponentially (Gen. 11:10-32). See "The Declining Life Span of the Patriarchs Before and After the Flood." Answering Objections
1. Many Otherwise Reliable Creationists Believe a Water Vapor Canopy is Unscientific. a. John C.
Whitcomb and Henry M.
Morris were responsible for co-writing The Genesis Flood in 1961.
Whitcomb had earned a Th.D. in Theology from Grace Theological Seminary.
Morris had earned a Ph.D. in Hydraulic
Engineering. His graduate work included a minor in geology, which stood
him in good stead when authoring The Genesis Flood.
Morris and Whitcomb advocated a global water vapor canopy. I have found their writing scientifically feasible and biblically correct. b. Sadly, in my opinion, a great many Biblical creationists have jettisoned the idea of a Water Vapor Canopy on "scientific" grounds. One example is Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D., who wrote the book The Genesis Account, A theological, historical, and scientific commentary on Genesis 1-11. He writes, on p. 159-160, Many
of the arguments for the canopy were faulty on scientific grounds. For
example, one argument is that the canopy would have protected humanity
from damaging radiation, so explaining the extremely long lifespans.
But water vapour is not a great shield for UV – you can be sunburned
in a cloudy day and while swimming. When it comes to cosmic radiation,
there is no evidence that this is involved in aging. One obvious
problem is that Noah
lived over a third of his life after the Flood
but
still lived to 950, the third-longest recorded lifespan in history. The
real explanation of longevity and its sharp decline seems to be the
exponential decay of fitness that follows a population bottleneck, as
per the Flood
– see Chapters 15 and 25 about the chronogenealogies in
Genesis 5 and 11.
Allow me to respond. First, a water vapor canopy would offer some protection from Ultraviolet (UV) radiation from the sun. UV radiation causes sunburn, skin aging, and DNA damage. Sarfati fails to understand this benefit of a Water Vapor Canopy. In fact, he belittles it. He says that "you can be sunburned in a cloudy day and while swimming." But he is not comparing apples to apples. His example of getting sunburned is in today's atmosphere, which is NOT protected by a substantial water vapor canopy. He has no way to compare today's atmosphere with the pre-flood atmosphere because there were no scientists present who were able to measure such things then! Here is what we know. Before the Flood people lived over 900 years! After the Flood, life expectancy plunged dramatically Second, the fact that Noah lived a third of his life after the Flood and still lived to be 950 (Gen. 9:29) does not nullify the benefits of the Water Vapor Canopy during the first 500 years of his life. This can be corroborated by the fact that Noah's son Shem, who benefited from the Water Vapor Canopy for only the first hundred years of his life, saw his lifespan drop precipitously from 950 years to only 600 years (Gen. 11:11). Moreover, Shem's son Arpachshad, who lived all of his life after the Flood and received no first-hand benefit from the Water Vapor Canopy, lived only 438 years (Gen. 11:12-13). Sarfati's biggest scientific problem with a Water Vapor Canopy, it appears, is the Water Canopy's absorption of infrared radiation from the sun. Here is what he writes on page 160: What
water absorbs very well is infrared, as any vibrational spectroscopist
knows. It is actually a far more important 'greenhouse gas' than CO2,
accounting for about 66% of the atmospheric 'greenhouse effect' on
earth, or maybe even as much as 95%. This leads to the major scientific
problem with the canopy theory – a water
vapour canopy thick enough to
provide more than about a metre's worth of floodwater would cook the
earth.
My response to Sarfati is as follows: (1)
The Scripture teaches, I believe that there was, indeed, a Water
Vapor
Canopy, the water above the raqiya
of the waters, that evidently was
precipitated out from its place at the Flood
(Gen. 7:1-8:19).
(2) Sarfati is taking a uniformitarian approach to the Water Vapor Canopy (see 2 Peter 3:3-7). He thinks that the way things are now is the way they have always been. That simply does not fit the data of Genesis 1-11. (3) Nothing in Genesis 1 is feasible from a scientific point of view. Each of the first six days displayed miracles from the hand of God that science cannot duplicate. Science cannot create an earth or the heavens or light (Gen. 1:1-5). Science cannot create a raqiya of the waters (Gen. 1:6-8). Science cannot create dry ground from the sea or create vegetation (Gen. 1:9-13). Science cannot create the sun, moon or stars in the raqiya of the heavens (Gen. 1:14-19). Science cannot create fish in the sea or birds that fly in the air (Gen. 1:20-23). Science cannot create land animals, wild or domesticated (Gen. 1:24-25). Science cannot create man and give him dominion over the earth and all the animals (Gen. 1:26-31). (4) As I have already implied, the raqiya of the waters was what provided just the right amount of infrared protection from the sun. It provided a uniform global temperature to produce vast amounts of vegetation and allow man to live without feathers or fur. That was a miracle, just as everything else in Genesis 1 was a miracle. Scientists can no more cogently refute that God made a workable raqiya of the waters in Gen. 1:6-8 than it can refute God's creation of anything else in Genesis 1. The raqiya of the waters worked exactly as God intended it to work, and the Biblical record spells it out. (5) If God's Word states that there was an expanse separating the waters of the ocean below from the waters (not clouds) above, I believe it. I will not allow nay-saying creationists to rob the text of what it says. 2. Some Otherwise Reliable Creationists Believe A Water Vapor Canopy is Unbiblical. The following quotation is taken from Jonathan D. Sarfati, PH.D., F.M. in his book The Genesis Account: A theological, historical, and scientific commentary on Genesis 1-11, p. 159. Sarfati is here approvingly quoting D. Russell Humphreys, an otherwise reliable Creationist: A worse problem is
that it [the Water
Vapor Canopy model] seems to
contradict Scripture itself. Humphreys (Humphreys, D.R., Starlight and
Time, pp. 61-62, 1994) cites Psalm 148:1-4:
Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord from the heavens; Praise him in the heights! Praise him, all his angels; Praise him, all his hosts! Praise him, sun and moon, Praise him, all you shining stars! Praise him, you highest heavens, And you waters above the heavens! Then he notes:
First notice the context in which these waters appear: “heavens
... heights ... sun and moon ... stars ... highest heavens.” This
suggests that the waters belong ‘way out there’ with all those other
heavenly objects, not close to the earth. Next, notice the timing. The
canopy model says that the waters above the expanse of the heavens
collapsed at the Genesis Flood, but this Psalm, written after the
Flood, implies that the waters above the heavens still exist in the
present. In fact, verses 5 and 6 of the Psalm say that the waters and
the heavens are to last at least as long as the time that this physical
universe endures:
Let them praise the name of the LORD! For he commanded and they were created. And he established them forever and ever; He gave a decree, and it shall not pass away. But if the waters are to endure “forever
and ever” above the heavens, then they can’t have collapsed.
This is my refutation of both Jonathan Sarfati and D. Russell Humphreys: 1. In the first place, neither Sarfati nor Humphreys, as far as I can tell, identify these waters “way out there” above the heavens. What are they, and where are they? Do they exist today? According to you they do. But where and what are they? Please tell us! Don’t remain silent! I don’t know of any scientist, creationist or secular, who has identified a substantial amount of waters outside our solar system or galaxy. Where are they? 2. The raqiya (expanse) God created on Day Two was clearly associated with waters, not with the sun, moon, or stars, for none of those even existed yet. The purpose of the raqiya God created on Day Two was singular – it was to separate between the waters which were underneath the expanse (i.e., the ocean) and the waters which were above the expanse (i.e., the Water Vapor Canopy). 3. The raqiya (expanse) of the heavens in Genesis 1:14-19 did not need to be created on the Fourth Day. It was already there from Day One, when God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1). What God did on the Fourth Day was to place lights in the expanse of the Heavens that already existed (space and deep space) (Gen. 1:14). Their purpose was to separate the day from the night, and to serve as signs and seasons and days and years. One purpose was to serve mankind as celestial clocks. God decreed that they should be as lights in the raqiya of the heavens to give light on the earth. And it came about just as God decreed (Gen. 1:15). We are told that God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night. Stars also (Gen. 1:16). In a summary statement we are told that “God placed them in the expanse (raqiya) of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.” (Gen. 1:17-19). 4. Clearly, there were two different expanses (raqiyas) with differing functions and differing vocabulary. Neither Sarfati nor Humphreys acknowledge these differences. 5. There must be another explanation for the waters referenced in Psalm 148:4, 6, other than the explanation that Sarfati and Humphreys have proposed. What is a better explanation? a. First, the word raqiya (expanse) occurs only twice
in the
book of Psalms. Psalm 148:1-6 does not contain either of those
occurrences. That does not help the case of Sarfati
and Humphreys.
b. The word raqiya (expanse) appears in Psalm
19:1 and Psalm 150:1. Allow me to quote them.
i. Psalm 19:1. "For the choir director. A
Psalm of David. The
heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring
the work of His hands."
(1) Clearly David was not
speaking of the raqiya of the
waters. In his day (some time between 1010 B.C. and 970 B.C.), that
expanse had long been dissipated in the waters of the Great Flood
(ca.
2348 B.C.).
(2) So, David had to be speaking of the raqiya of the heavens, the realm which housed the sun, moon, and stars. ii. Psalm 150:1. "Praise the LORD! Praise
God in His sanctuary; Praise Him in His mighty expanse!"
(1)
This is an exhortation to
praise God in His sanctuary (tabernacle) here on earth, and it is a
command to praise God in his expanse in the heavens. All people and
beings
everywhere are commanded to praise God!
(2) Once again David had to be speaking of the raqiya of the heavens, the realm which housed the sun, moon, and stars. The expanse which separated the waters below the expanse from the waters above the expanse had been absorbed into the expanse of the heavens centuries earlier. There were now no longer waters above the expanse that could be emptied as the windows of the heavens (Gen. 7:11) onto the earth below. That would never happen again (Gen. 9:8-17) c. So
what is a better understanding of Psalm 148:4, "Praise Him, highest
heavens, And the waters that are above the heavens"? And of Psalm
148:6, For He has established them forever and ever; He has made a
decree which will not pass away"?
i. I
believe Henry
M. Morris, in his book "The
Genesis Record," has a better explanation on p. 62 of his book:
ii. Although the waters above the firmament were condensed and precipitated in the Flood, they will apparently be restored in the millennial earth and in the new earth which God will create. Psalm 148:4, 6 speaks of the "waters that be above the heavens" which, like the stars, will be established "for ever and ever." iii. I believe that explanation squares with Scripture and with true science better than does the explanation of Jonathan Sarfati and D. Russell Humphreys. 3. Jonathan Sarfati believes that the dissipation and condensation of a water vapor canopy is not a valid explanation for the obviously shortened life-spans of the early human race after the Great Flood. He believes in a "population bottleneck" instigated by the Flood. Here is a quote from Sarfati in his book on p. 160: The
real explanation of longevity and its sharp decline seems to be
the exponential decay of fitness that follows a population bottleneck,
as per the Flood – see chapters 15 and 24 about the chronogenealogies
in Genesis 5 and 11.
In chapter 15, beginning on p. 467, Sarfati explains his reasoning. He asks, "How Did The Patriarchs Live So Long?" Then he proceeds to answer: Probably
the most striking feature of Genesis 5 is that our ancestors lived
about 10 times longer than people do today. This should be believed
because God's word says it, and He was an eye-witness. Modern science
is now shedding light on possible mechanisms.
Sarfati has another heading: "Proper Scientific Explanation: Genetics." Underneath that heading he continues: Scientific knowledge of the aging process
is far from complete. However, genetics provides an explanation for the
relative
ages of the pre-Flood
and post-Flood
people. This can be seen in the
transitions from the pre-Flood
and post-Flood
people recorded in
Genesis 11, which shows an exponential drop of lifespans (see fig.
15.2). As will be explained in Ch. 24, the population bottleneck at the
Flood
explains why genetic fitness should decay in the manner recorded.
When it comes to why we live to a certain age, reasons why living organisms deteriorate with age are not well understood. A factor is mutations accumulating in our cells as they divide. Sarfati continues on pp. 686-687: Recent
advanced computer simulations vindicate this proposal, showing that an
exponential decay of lifespans fits well with accumulating mutations
after the catastrophic population bottleneck at the Flood. This can be
seen from comparing the decay curve produced by the computer simulation
with the recorded lifespans from Noah to the present day.
Sarfati explicitly addresses the sudden decrease in Shem's lifespan on p. 687. His section title is: Why was Shem's Lifespan Much Shorter than Noah's? Here is his discussion: As
shown, genome decay after a population bottleneck explains the general
trend of lifespan decay after the Flood. But what about Shem, born
before the bottleneck, yet living only 2/3 as long as most of his
ancestors? There is of course the ever-present possibility in any
individual of a non-aging-related cause of death such as disease or
accident. But there is also a plausible genetic explanation: he was
born when his father was 502, i.e. over half-way through his lifespan.
His ancestors were much younger when they fathered their named sons. It
has long been known that children born to aged mothers have a higher
risk of developing non-hereditary genetic disorders such as Down's
Syndrome, and it is plausible that Mrs. Noah was about the same age as
Noah.... But even if she were much younger, more recent research points
to aged fathers as a major
source of genetic disorders. This should not be surprising since men
keep producing sperm throughout their lives from the division of stem
cells (some 840 divisions by age 50). In theory, the risks of
spontaneous mutation increase with each round of sperm cell division,
so the sperm of older men are more likely to carry mutations.
In response, I do not deny that cellular mutations, long-term, have deleterious effects upon human longevity. However, genetic decay utterly fails to explain why the nine Pre-Flood Patriarchs (excluding Enoch) of Adam to Noah had an average life-expectancy of 912 years. And genetic decay utterly fails to explain why the next nine Post-Flood Patriarchs, from Shem to Terah, had an average life-expectancy of only 333 years! Genetic decay does not start out gradually, and then increase precipitously in the space of three generations (from Noah to Shem to Arpachshad – 950 to 600 to 438 years). (See the table at "The Declining Life Span of the Patriarchs Before and After the Great Flood." The Biblical text says nothing whatsoever about genetic decay as the explanation for the sudden decline in longevity. But the Biblical record has a great deal to say about a Global Flood from Genesis 6:13-9:19. Why reject the clear implications of Scripture for the "made-up" computer model explanations of modern science? Conclusion
In spite of the objections of some otherwise reputable Biblical Creation advocates, I believe the evidence is very strong that on Day 2 of the Creation Week God created an expanse which separated the water below the expanse from the water above the expanse. I believe the water below the expanse was a shoreless ocean, and that the water above the expanse was a Water Vapor Canopy that surrounded the earth. This Canopy provided a Greenhouse or Terrarium effect upon Earth and its inhabitants, both human and animal. There were no tornadoes, no floods, no droughts, no clouds, no rain, no snow, and no seasonal variation such as seedtime and harvest, summer and winner in the Pre-Flood era. There was probably a "hyperbaric" benefit to the plants and animals, contributing to long life and a world without deserts that was filled with vegetation, available both to animals and to man. We can identify the Global Flood as the cause of a great many changes. It scoured the earth of vegetation, which, when buried quickly under great pressure, turned into the abundant oil and gas reserves found in many places around the earth. The collapse of the Water Vapor Canopy allowed cold air to descend upon the warm earth and its warm oceans. The warm air from the oceans evaporated and became great quantities of snow which fell upon the earth. This, in turn, caused Polar Ice Caps and an Ice Age. Without the protective water vapor canopy, man's longevity decreased precipitously and exponentially. This global flood was so significant that the Apostle Peter labeled it as one of three God-caused events that mockers overlook when they fixate on uniformitarianism and get completely mixed up regarding the passage of time on the earth (2 Pet. 3:3-13). Two of these events have already happened – the creation of the earth out of water and the flooding of the entire earth by means of water. One event is still future – the destruction of the earth and the entirety of the universe by fire. Secular science cannot explain a single one of these events! All three are miracles by the hand of God! Then God will create new heavens and a new earth in which only righteousness and righteous people will exist. Therefore, we who anticipate these coming changes need to be diligent to be found by God in peace, spotless and blameless. We need to be on our guard so that we will not be carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from steadfastness. Instead, we need to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ (2 Pet. 3:14-18). Footnotes
1
Kulikovsky, A. S., Creation, Fall,
Restoration, p. 131, 2009. Text 1
2 Sarfati, Jonathan D., The Genesis Account, p. 154, 2015. Text 2 Return to Exegesis of Genesis Return to Cosmology Updated October 1, 2026
|
|