How old is the Earth?

 A Good Question

A question as deceptively simple as "how old is the earth?" turns out to contain some deep subquestions. 

Like, Do we just buy into the latest scientific theories?

And, Is the Bible intended to be a scientific text book with answers to such questions?

The Two Books

It's helpful in this enquiry, to think about the Book of Scripture and the Book of Creation. The Book of Scripture, the 66 books of the Bible were given so that we might come to know God personally; the God we already know exists.

The Book of Creation is designed to reveal the God of Creation to us and to glorify his mighty name. "O Lord, my Lord, how majestic is your name through all the earth." "The heavens declare the glory of God." 

Everything we see around us from our amazing bodies and blow away minds to the the furthest biggest baddest quasars scream, "God exists - and isn't he amazing!" 

That's a major purpose behind the Book of Creation.

The Two Books must Agree

Since the two books come from the same Author, they must agree with one another. That is the starting point for gaining an answer to our question, how old is the earth? The Book of Creation cannot disagree with the Book of Creation.

If they disagree, the disagreement must be apparent, not real.

Either we have misunderstood what the Book of Scripture is teaching, or we have misunderstood what the Book of Creation is teaching - or we've misunderstood both.

Add to these starting points, the fact - surely this is true - that Scripture has not been given to yield a precise chronology or science of the history of the earth. If the Scriptures did contain "final science" no-one would be able to understand it, not today nor tomorrow, not ever.

(I'm with the long-dead cardinal who said something like the Scriptures tell us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.)

The Big Theories of Science

On the science side, we would be fools to buy into all of its grand theories. The smaller theorems will probably stand the test of time or be proven to be approximations of more accurate theorems, but the big theories - such as the Big Bang with its associated time lines - are likely to be provisional.

(For interests sake, some pretty weird bolt-ons have had to be introduced into the Big Bang theory to make it work. For example the invention of a period of rapid inflation near the start of the big bang, and the invention of dark matter to explain the acceleration of the universe. These bolt-ons raise the suspicion that the BB theory is not going to turn out to be true). 

We would be fools to take the theory of evolution or the Big Bang theory as fact.

(The sceptic should bear in mind that in the last century two enormous theories suffered paradigm shifts - the steady state theory which said the universe was eternal gave way to the Big Bang theory; and the "cooling shrinking earth" theory gave way to plate tectonics). 

There is not a single reason in the world to suppose that the big theories of today's science will not be the subject material of comedians in the not too distant future.

Where does that leave us?

On the surface it would appear that the Book of Scripture teaches the earth is say 10,000 years old while the book of Creation seems to teach that the earth is far older than that. 

Remember the options?

(1) Perhaps the Bible does not really teach that the earth is 10000 years old

There seems little doubt that Adam and Eve - real human beings - only trace back to thousands of years in time. But are the six days of Genesis one, 24 hour days? Can we be sure, especially when they have a poetic (or at least 'elevated prose') form about them?

(2) Perhaps the Book of Creation does not teach millions and billions

Scientists may have rock dating all wrong. Although many "clocks" in nature (presumably put there by God) seem to point to an age much greater than 10,000 years, these dating systems could be completely wrong. 

(3) Perhaps we've got both wrong

The other possibility is that both interpretations are wrong - and no-one knows how old the earth is.

We should be A-OK with such a possibility. It would show how tiny our minds are, and it would force us to ask far more important questions of Genesis 1,2 and 3.

The most important teachings

The most important teachings of these chapters have nothing to do with how old the universe or the earth is. 

Instead they tell us about the nature of mankind. We've been made male and female, we've been created heterosexual. There is an ordered relationship between the sexes. We have been made in the image of God and we're much more important than the animals. 

We've been made to know, love and obey God. 

But now we are fallen, ashamed, foolish and broken, hiding from God.

Yet finding that God in his immeasurable love for us keeps searching and seeking us out. This God rather than abandoning us to the fate we deserve reaches out and promises Adam and Eve a Saviour who will destroy the Tempter and restore us to God and bring us, in time, to a better Eden.

This Good News is infinitely more important than any arguments about how old the earth is.

AI Image:
Draw old earth and new earth