Science and Jesus (4): Did God Create the World in Six Days?

In my previous post, I made the comment that we must read the bible biblically and theologically. I would like to examine this further in this article.

There are 66 books of the bible; the bible is broken into two major sections, the Old and New Testaments. There is great diversity in literary style- ranging from poetry to historical narrative to apocalyptic literature. Reading the bible does take some understanding of these literary styles. Additionally, the bible was written from two thousand to four thousand years ago. Therefore, an understanding of the historical situations of the authors is very much needed as we are quite detached from the lives of these people. Here is a great video discussing these issues:

The book of Genesis is the first book in the bible. It holds a fascinating account of creation in Genesis 1. However, these first few segments of Genesis have come under great dispute by New Atheist Richard Dawkins and many of the Atheist community. They claim that science has clearly disproven the accuracy of the bible if you take Genesis 1 literalistically. Dr John Dickson, the man interviewed in the video states that we must read the Genesis account literally. A full copy of the interview is available on the God Science Dvd.

Dr Dickson goes onto to explain that a document named Enuma Elish was found in the mid 19th century. This document originated from the old Babylonian Empire and it details an account of creation by many of their gods. Scholars believe that the Enuman Elish document predates Genesis 1, making the account readily available for the early Jewish hearers of the Moses (the author of Genesis) time. Enuma Elish makes the claim that these gods created the world in several days, including life, which is similar to Genesis 1.

There are some close parallels between Enuma Elish and the Genesis account, however, there are also many profound distinctions in Genesis 1. These are:
• Genesis- One God created the world; Enuma Elish- many gods
• Genesis- God gives human great importance in his creation, where as Enuma Elish claims that we were created to do the work of the gods.
• Genesis claims that God made the world good; Enuma Elish claims the world was evil
• Genesis- God was purposeful and ordered in creating the world; Enuma Elish’s gods were erratic and chaotic
For more information, check out wikiChristian.

Therefore, what is the overall point of Genesis 1 in light of Enuma Elish? What was Moses aim in writing this text? If you were a Jewish person living around 1500BC and were to pick up the Genesis 1 account you would notice straight away that the one and only God whom they worship created everything good and with purpose. You would understand that the world was created good by God and that we were made to be in relationship with God. At no point would you come to the assumption that this account was detailing the exact processes and mechanisms God used to create the world. All you would want to know is that a loving God achieved it. We too must read the Genesis account in this fashion. Reading it, and any other book of the bible, literalistically will make it hard to interpret and understand. Furthermore, the overall push of the bible is to lead you to Jesus, the creator of the world and saviour of his children. Jesus died on a roman cross for our sins so we can be reunited with our creator and enjoy eternal life.

There are many brilliant resources out there for those who are interested in researching into this topic. Below are some links to a few recommended sites and resources:
• Centre for Public Christianity  – This is a fantastic site lead by Dr John Dickson and Dr Greg Clark who are responsible for producing The Life of Jesus, The Christ Files and God Science.
• Answers in Genesis 
• God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God
• Professor John Lennox’s website
• God Science: Creation, Darwin and the End of Faith
• The Case for a Creator
• Best Bible Science

If you have any comments to make, please feel free to add them to this post.