"Christians should be able to agree to disagree, on disputable matters*, without being disagreeable."
* issues which are not essential to faith and doctrine
"four views on how stuff got here"
1. naturalistic (atheistic) evolution
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2. theistic evolution
3. old earth creation (day-age and similar theories) [2] HOW OLD? NASA says
4. young earth creation (6-24 hour days, universe is just over 6000 years old) [1]
• Christians should learn to agree to disagree without being disagreeable about views 2-4.
• The science used to understand views 1&2 is often the same, the presupposition about where the cosmos came from is the issue: ‘God’ or ‘chance’.
• Can we know empirically which is right? Or it is a matter of belief?
• Theologically, it is important that Adam and Eve be real people due to the issues of the fall and redemption.
• three words to use carefully
i. know
ii. think
iii. believe
• does Scripture DEMAND that a Christian hold one of views 2-4? Some say yes, some say no, what do you say?
• remember that this question, Can God do x, y or z? is NOT in question here... how we understand his message about the beginning is...
NOW GO to read Gen. 1-2
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[1] Ussher now concentrated on his research and writing, and returned to the study of chronology and the church fathers. After a 1647 work on the origin of the creeds in 1648 Ussher published a treatise on the calendar. This was a warm-up for his most famous work, the Annales veteris testamenti, a prima mundi origine deducti ("Annals of the Old Testament, deduced from the first origins of the world"), which appeared in 1650 and its continuation, Annalium pars postierior in 1654. In this work, he famously claimed, that the Earth was created at nightfall preceding 23 October, 4004 BC. Other scholars calculated their own dates for Creation, such as that by the Cambridge academic, John Lightfoot. The time is frequently misquoted as being 9 a.m., noon or 9 p.m. on 23 October. See the related article on the calendar for a discussion of its claims and methodology.
Ussher's work is still referenced by Young Earth Creationists (who believe that the Earth is approximately 6,000 years old) and has been much ridiculed as a symbol of religious obscurantism. In fact, calculating the year of creation may seem a trivial and slightly eccentric activity to some nowadays with the benefit of geology and palaeontology - the Earth now being dated by the scientific community at around four billion years old, with the universe nine billion years older than that - but at the time it was an important and difficult task which many Renaissance scholars, such as Joseph Justus Scaliger had attempted. Ussher's chronology represents a considerable feat of scholarship. It required the Bible to be firmly anchored in history, which needed a huge depth of learning in ancient history, including the rise of the Persians, Greeks and Romans. Then constructing a biblical chronology required expertise in biblical languages, and in-depth knowledge of the Bible. His account of historical events for which he had multiple sources other than the Bible is usually in close agreement with modern accounts; for example, he places the death of Alexander in 323 BC and that of Julius Caesar in 44 BC. The period of time between the Flood and the Creation depended on the version of the Old Testament that was used: Hebrew (1656 years), Samaritan Pentateuch (1307 years), or the Ethiopic text (2262 years). Ussher favoured the Hebrew version. Annals has recently been republished in modern English.
-from Bishop Ussher
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[2] A critique of the "age - day can be found here... along with a HOST of pro-young earth material if you are interested!