G-d created fully grown trees, not just seeds. G-d created Adam a fully grown man, not just a baby.
G-d similarly created a "grown" world. A world that scientifically appears much older much in the same way Adam appeared scientifically much older than one day old on his birthday.
That is one thing we must keep in mind.
We also must keep in mind the limitations of radioactive dating which makes many many assumptions and extrapolations about the way elements interacted thousands of years ago when no such data was being recorded.
The Torah does not leave its simple interpretation and under its simple interpretation the world is exactly 5,769 years old.
Lulab (i'm addressing you since you are more able to discuss things logically than others making this mature earth argument)
I know the L Rebbe taught that they were 24h days.
There is the issue of extrapolation against the fossil dating.. BUT , natan aviezer points out in Fossils and Faith.. That there are many scientific disciplines all using different techniques that come to an old earth. Of course, it may be that they all draw wrong conclusions due to assumptions of extrapolation.
(I have heard in a wacky amnon yitzchak video, a tape of somebody that was obviously a christian scientist, saying that there are some measurements that imply a young earth. I don't know about that though, how valid the research is. I doubt it is any good peer reviewed journal)
Regarding the mature earth argument, it's true MAYBE G-d made it to appear old. But the annoying thing about those that make that argument, is that all te examples they give are not analogous.
We are talking about an earth where fossils are planted to fool us into thinking the earth is old. What is the point other than to fool us?
Is there any such precedent?
People , as you have, give the man example.
Let's look at the man example. Adam was created mature? Why? To fool us into thinking he grew up normally? NO! The obvious reason is so that he could survive himself on his own. If G-d wanted to fool us with that one he could have mentioned a baby bottle! (or fossilized it or whatever)
Here is another example. to argue a precedent for G-d fooling us. I think the argument is flawed too
We have a tradition that G-d hides himself from us in this world. (and obviously in our times he does hide himself , moreso than in the past anyway)
Things appear "natural".
So, there, the argument is.. G-d created the laws of physics to fool us into thinking that the world runs naturally , without G-d.
This argument suffers the same problem. The obvious reason for creating the laws of physics or rather, for running the world following or in accordance with those laws, is so that we can live in it and anticipate things and build things and move where we want, and work in it.
If it didn't, we'd have problems, so you can't say it's just to fool us. Or, no other reason than to fool us. Or that there's no reason , so it must be to fool us based on that tradition.
Let's look at the fossils again.
remember, we are assuming 24h days of creation here.
Now consider fossils being planted. There is really no obvious reason for fossils to create the illusion of an old earth, other than to confuse us into thinking the days are long when they aren't. To perhaps make the biblical account appear false(to one that assumes 24h).
That does not compared with the man example or the physics example.
So if it is the case, there really is no precedent for it. Or rather, those examples don't work as good precedents.
another point(less thought through).. man really was mature(he had just skipped the ageing process), the earth really is run in accordance with the laws of physics. It's not like false evidence planted, as the mature earth(young earth!) people would say. The young earth people, the L rebbe and other charedim anyway, are saying the earth really is young, and fossils are just planted to fool us. This inherent lying/fooling doesn't exist in the other examples(if anybody is fooled into thinking that Adam did age to that age-20, and that because of the laws of physics, there is no G-d running things, then that's accidental not inherent in the evidence). So the analogies don't work in that sense either.
Topic: Is the world 6000 years old? (Read 20586 times)