Was there ever a time when the Earth existed, and the Sun didn't?

[Tcg]

.
The first creation story found in Genesis 1 starts with the creation of the heavens and the earth. Sometime later the sun was reportedly created. Is this possible?

Was there ever a time when the earth existed, and the sun didn't?


Tcg

[Wootah]

.
The first creation story found in Genesis 1 starts with the creation of the heavens and the earth. Sometime later the sun was reportedly created. Is this possible?

Was there ever a time when the earth existed, and the sun didn't?


Tcg

If it is a creation event of God the order probably matters more theologically.

Take from Peter Leithart A House for My Name

creating the space Filling the space
Day 1 - light/dark = Day 4 - sun moon start
Day 2 - water above/below = Day 5 - birds and fish
Day 3 - waters/land = Day 6 land animals and man

What’s interesting is that the first three days match the second three days: Dividing Filling Day 1: light/dark Day 4: sun, moon, stars Day 2: waters above/below Day 5: birds and fish Day 3: waters/land Day 6: land animals and man Day 7: Sabbath And so, at the end of the six days of creation, God has finished a “three-story” house. Above is the “tent curtain” of blue sky, then the dry land, and finally the waters “below” the earth.

Leithart, Peter. A House for My Name: A Survey of the Old Testament (p. 35). Canon Press. Kindle Edition.

[brunumb]

....the bible doesn't give a date for the creation of the sun ...

As I said, the word sun isn't mentioned at all [in the creation account]

..., but that is irrelevant.

How convenient.

... It's the order that is under consideration. And it has the order wrong.

Well that depends on how one interprets the text. It has already been pointed out by brunumb and others that light emitting bodies can exist while there is "darkness" on earth.


JW

We still have no accounting for the light ("let there be light") at the beginning without any source for it. Where was that light if the earth was in darkness?
We have no explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun which essentially defines evening and day on the earth. The earth is never totally in darkness as it is always partially illuminated by the sun.
The order of events in Genesis makes no sense even with the most warped interpretation of the text such as per Peter Leithart in the post above.

[TRANSPONDER]

....the bible doesn't give a date for the creation of the sun ...

As I said, the word sun isn't mentioned at all [in the creation account]

..., but that is irrelevant.

How convenient.

... It's the order that is under consideration. And it has the order wrong.

Well that depends on how one interprets the text. It has already been pointed out by brunumb and others that light emitting bodies can exist while there is "darkness" on earth.


JW

We still have no accounting for the light ("let there be light") at the beginning without any source for it. Where was that light if the earth was in darkness?
We have no explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun which essentially defines evening and day on the earth. The earth is never totally in darkness as it is always partially illuminated by the sun.
The order of events in Genesis makes no sense even with the most warped interpretation of the text such as per Peter Leithart in the post above.

Yes. The implication or point of the op is that the only light that could be the light of Genesis is the sun, and Genesis says the sun was created later. So the implication is clear - Genesis claims the light of the sun was there before the sun was made to mark it. It says clearly (don't these people read their own Bible?) that God separated this light from dark to make day and night. And this was morning and evening. Clear as day.

This is nothing to do with light of the stars or the symbolism of Light of God. We are talking about daylight and night, but the sun and moon aren't created (or 'formed' some might insist, though it makes no difference) until day 4.

This is an old apologetic and is plainly wrong other than to the most denialist science denier. I Imagine that few Creationists, even would claim that the sun was made after the earth.

So if course it has to be 'interpreted'; or explained away. The Cloud Cover (or some make it an ice -shell) apologetic argues that the sun and moon were there of course but couldn't be seen because of cloud. It let daylight through but the sun itself couldn't be seen until the clouds cleared away.

I have already commented on this - it might work for someone living at the time who saw this from the surface of the earth and misunderstood what was happening. But there was no -one, only God revealing it to Moses (or whoever wrote this stuff) and not telling him the truth when it would be just as easy to reveal the truth - what a coup for the Bible when Science catches up with it and confirms it.

But it doesn't. It utterly refutes it and the Bible - or rather Genesis - apologistsi have to wangle and misrepresent, folks, because light and dark are day and night, morning and evening, and that is what it says, and they may fool themselves, but I consider it impudent that they try to fool us, it is disrespect to their opponent never mind disrespect to the Bible. At least, we goddless do it the respect of reading what it says rather than rewriting it (as they do all the time, OT to New) to make it say what they want it to say.

[Tcg]

....the bible doesn't give a date for the creation of the sun ...

As I said, the word sun isn't mentioned at all [in the creation account]

..., but that is irrelevant.

How convenient.

... It's the order that is under consideration. And it has the order wrong.

Well that depends on how one interprets the text. It has already been pointed out by brunumb and others that light emitting bodies can exist while there is "darkness" on earth.


JW

We still have no accounting for the light ("let there be light") at the beginning without any source for it. Where was that light if the earth was in darkness?
We have no explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun which essentially defines evening and day on the earth. The earth is never totally in darkness as it is always partially illuminated by the sun.
The order of events in Genesis makes no sense even with the most warped interpretation of the text such as per Peter Leithart in the post above.

Yes. The implication or point of the op is that the only light that could be the light of Genesis is the sun, and Genesis says the sun was created later. So the implication is clear - Genesis claims the light of the sun was there before the sun was made to mark it. It says clearly (don't these people read their own Bible?) that God separated this light from dark to make day and night. And this was morning and evening. Clear as day.

This is nothing to do with light of the stars or the symbolism of Light of God. We are talking about daylight and night, but the sun and moon aren't created (or 'formed' some might insist, though it makes no difference) until day 4.

This is an old apologetic and is plainly wrong other than to the most denialist science denier. I Imagine that few Creationists, even would claim that the sun was made after the earth.

So if course it has to be 'interpreted'; or explained away. The Cloud Cover (or some make it an ice -shell) apologetic argues that the sun and moon were there of course but couldn't be seen because of cloud. It let daylight through but the sun itself couldn't be seen until the clouds cleared away.

I have already commented on this - it might work for someone living at the time who saw this from the surface of the earth and misunderstood what was happening. But there was no -one, only God revealing it to Moses (or whoever wrote this stuff) and not telling him the truth when it would be just as easy to reveal the truth - what a coup for the Bible when Science catches up with it and confirms it.

But it doesn't. It utterly refutes it and the Bible - or rather Genesis - apologistsi have to wangle and misrepresent, folks, because light and dark are day and night, morning and evening, and that is what it says, and they may fool themselves, but I consider it impudent that they try to fool us, it is disrespect to their opponent never mind disrespect to the Bible. At least, we goddless do it the respect of reading what it says rather than rewriting it (as they do all the time, OT to New) to make it say what they want it to say.

What I'm seeing is that even those who claim that the Bible is their authority, higher of course than science, at times actually place science in the position of the arbiter of truth. They see for example this problem with the order of creation based on what we know of science and change their interpretation of the Bible based on it. Often these interpretations include aspects no one would have come up with absent the science. Science has become the king whether they realize it or not.

Another option of course is to deny science. The Bible stays king, but this requires some believers to accept absurdities. The universe is 6,000 years old for example. On top of that, it requires some kind of explanation for why scientists would teach falsehood. The answer is often, well those evil atheist scientists are trying to hide the truth of God. Well, what have these done with all the Christian scientists? There's a whole bunch of them. How have the atheists silenced them? The reality of course is that they haven't. There is no conspiracy to hide the truth. Probably it's simply because the atheists and the Christians agree at least on scientific matters.


Tcg

[Tcg]

[Replying to Tcg in post #24]

Another way to resolve this issue, is to realize that the author/s of Genesis 1 and 2 had no intention for it to be taken as a literal account. This resolves the problem to some degree. One doesn't have to deny science or use science to read into the accounts that which isn't there. I've heard these accounts described as Hebrew poetry. Okay, that may make sense, but I haven't seen this explained much less been given an explanation as to what the author/s intended to teach if it is poetry.


Tcg

[TRANSPONDER]

Absolutely. I have mentioned before that this is a the same apologetics method as cult -think or alternative science, whether UFOs, Atlantis or Ancient ET technology, and surprisingly often they drift together, like Atlantis (ancient seafaring and map -making) soon incorporated ancient science and thus flying saucers.

And Creationism (Christian and Islamic) soon latched onto this and not so much to push flying saucer pilots carving stone blocks for the pyramids with power saws, but to show that science had got it all wrong (particularly ancient history in Biblical lands). Now we see the agenda, if science is wrong about how the pyramids were built, then they are wrong about everything else that they claim refutes Genesis.

But there is an elephant in the room (there is a whole herd of them, but we only have room for one at a time); it is fine and good to refute science with inexplicable problems it can't answer, but Creationism can't make itself a laughing stock. It can argue away geological evidence for an old earth or that refutes a global flood, but they have to draw the line at a flat earth, a geocentric system or an earth that existed before the sun. They may reject the science of an old earth, an ancient universe and old geology, but the rest has to be made to fit the science or they'd laugh their case out of court.

Indeed, some see a 6 day creation as laughable and tried to fit a week into 14 billion years. Or they agree evolution, but see a god as doing it. This is all good, as these people are sliding the slippery slop of cafeteria Christianity down to irreligious Theism and 'maybe more', as the dating sites say.

The creationists remain implacably unbending on YE and Evolution (1) and they are incredibly well organised and well funded in peddling their arguments. They can be beat, especially if they aren't allowed to control the discussion. But the counter to creationism is Not supported or funded and pretty much depends on individuals and their work.

I have to mention how much alternative history (and archaeology) sounds like Genesis and Exodus apologetics. The argument for the Ark sounds uncannily like argument that Egyptians built the Aztec temples, or the Moses sinai site sounds like Flying saucer pilots built the Inca stonework. Not to mention that Pilate's seals on a Jewish Tomb gives me the same unease as a renaissance painting supposedly showing a Flying saucer.

(1) I have to reiterate the rather amusing situation with IC, because it actually argues for evolution, but only because God makes it work, but somehow they all saw it as proving that Evolution didn't work, which was the agenda they started with. In fact IC validates Theistic evolution, not YE creation.

[Diogenes]

[Replying to Tcg in post #24]

Another way to resolve this issue, is to realize that the author/s of Genesis 1 and 2 had no intention for it to be taken as a literal account. This resolves the problem to some degree. One doesn't have to deny science or use science to read into the accounts that which isn't there. I've heard these accounts described as Hebrew poetry. Okay, that may make sense, but I haven't seen this explained much less been given an explanation as to what the author/s intended to teach if it is poetry.

This is a reasonable approach; however, most Bible apologists go to extraordinary lengths to attempt to demonstrate their book is perfect, is "The Word of God," and therefore it must be science (and your own two eyes) that is faulty when it proves evolution, accurate cosmology, or the age of the Earth.

Most independent Biblical scholars agree the Jewish Bible should be understood as literature, human literature, written to praise a tribal god; that it contains wisdom and an historical account of a group of people over many centuries.
But the amateur apologist refuses to acknowledge this truth. Instead, they perform mental gymnastics, use horribly biased blogs and 3d rate movies to twist a pig's ear into a silk purse no reasonable person would buy. They jump up with giddy delight when science coincides with their beliefs, and offer this isolated event as "proof" of divine authorship. They love it when archeologists find a remnant of an ancient city described in their favorite book, but dispute the experts when they find little evidence of the "Exodus,"* as described in that book.

What can you call this, but "intellectual dishonesty?"

________________________
*"Mainstream scholarship no longer accepts the biblical Exodus, the as reliable history for a number of reasons. Most scholars agree that the Exodus stories were written centuries after the apparent setting of the stories."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Exodus

Even the Biblical Archeology Society agrees the account in the Bible is problematic, that there is disagreement re: the date, and the 'how' and even whether it happened at all.
https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/dai ... r-fiction/

So much for the "founding myth of of the Israelites."

[JehovahsWitness]

We still have no accounting for the light ("let there be light") at the beginning without any source for it.

Why do you think there was no source for the light? Did the text not say in the beginning God created ..." the heavens"?

Where was that light if the earth was in darkness?

Where is the light if your room is in darkness?

We have no explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun which essentially defines evening and day on the earth.

Not if the evenings and mornings are metaphors.

The earth is never totally in darkness as it is always partially illuminated by the sun.

Is the word "totally" in the source text?

To learn more please go to other posts related to...

THE SUN , THE PHYSICAL HEAVENS and ...THE 7 CREATIVE DAYS OF GENESIS

[brunumb]

We still have no accounting for the light ("let there be light") at the beginning without any source for it.

Why do you think there was no source for the light? Did the text not say in the beginning God created ..." the heavens"?

OK. Now account for the light.

Where was that light if the earth was in darkness?

Where is the light if your room is in darkness?

That does not answer my question. Earth is there in space. There is light. Earth is in darkness. Totally is not in the text but using critical thinking skills and logical interpretation it is clear that the text implies total darkness. Please give a logical explanation to account for all this without resorting to side-track questioning.

We have no explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun which essentially defines evening and day on the earth.

The earth is never totally in darkness as it is always partially illuminated by the sun.

Is the word "totally" in the source text?

That does not answer the question. Do you have an explanation for "and the evening and the morning were the first day" when we have no sun?

The order of events in Genesis makes no sense even with the most warped interpretation of the text such as per Peter Leithart in the post above.

Then I suggest its best notnto settle on a warped interpretation.

Agreed. Do you have a non-warped explanation or interpretation that resolves the issues of conflict about the order of creation events in Genesis?

[Diogenes]

[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #28]
This is a perfect example of what I write about apologists defending the Bible regardless of its anti factual non logic. No effort is made here to explain 'the light.' There is a fairly pathetic reference to "the heavens," this vague reference to "heaven" is typical of the cosmology of the time.
"So Elohim made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so. Elohim called the dome “Sky”. (Genesis 1:7–8a)
https://isthatinthebible.wordpress.com/ ... -theology/

We now know the 'heavens' are just clouds in the sky. There is no 'heaven.' This can easily be ascertained by simply looking at a photo of the Earth, or riding in the space station.

There seems to be a fear on this forum, to call out "intellectual dishonesty" as if it is a personal insult, or 'uncivil' or otherwise violates a rule of the forum. But I do not know a more accurate way to denominate the use of science when it appears to further one's argument, yet to denigrate science when it exposes your beliefs for the fantasies they are.