Genesis Flood Local Or Global ?

[BrotherEastman]

Originally Posted by Aquila

That's the essence of religion. I don't see religion as science or science as religion. The two are very different concepts and are worlds apart.

But, it may have been a more localized flood. If one translates "earth" as "land" we have a loal flood and still a quite literal interpretation.

I understand that before there were continental drifts, there was only one land, which in my estimation fits quite nicely with the interpretation "land" as in singular.

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by BrotherEastman

I understand that before there were continental drifts, there was only one land, which in my estimation fits quite nicely with the interpretation "land" as in singular.

Yep. A few hundred million years before Noah.

[BrotherEastman]

Originally Posted by Timmy

Yep. A few hundred million years before Noah.

That is, of course, if you believe it took "millions" of years to happen. A worldwide flood can do lots of strange things to this earth.

Imagine, millions of pounds of pressure per square inch beneath floodwaters that would cause immediate fossilization. Imagine all those dino's and petrified forrests that were found on just about every continent except for Antarctica. If the land was singular, then my logic wouldn't be that far off the mark now would it Timmy?

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by BrotherEastman

That is, of course, if you believe it took "millions" of years to happen. A worldwide flood can do lots of strange things to this earth.

Imagine, millions of pounds of pressure per square inch beneath floodwaters that would cause immediate fossilization. Imagine all those dino's and petrified forrests that were found on just about every continent except for Antarctica. If the land was singular, then my logic wouldn't be that far off the mark now would it Timmy?

Um, sure. I guess so. But we'd have to deal with the breakup of the supercontinent, and fast. The violence of a fast breakup (even if it's on the order of a thousand years) would be unimaginable. Earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis that would wipe out mankind (again!). And God would have to tamper with the evidence, to make it look like it never even happened. Like these guys:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yb0l1nsd4CI

[pelathais]

Originally Posted by Aquila

That's the essence of religion. I don't see religion as science or science as religion. The two are very different concepts and are worlds apart.

But, it may have been a more localized flood. If one translates "earth" as "land" we have a loal flood and still a quite literal interpretation.

There are many ways to approach the problem. I think the most popular way is to simply say, "What problem?"

[pelathais]

Originally Posted by BrotherEastman

I understand that before there were continental drifts, there was only one land, which in my estimation fits quite nicely with the interpretation "land" as in singular.

Originally Posted by Timmy

Yep. A few hundred million years before Noah.

Originally Posted by BrotherEastman

That is, of course, if you believe it took "millions" of years to happen. A worldwide flood can do lots of strange things to this earth.

Imagine, millions of pounds of pressure per square inch beneath floodwaters that would cause immediate fossilization. Imagine all those dino's and petrified forrests that were found on just about every continent except for Antarctica. If the land was singular, then my logic wouldn't be that far off the mark now would it Timmy?

There was no "before continental drift..." except the molten earth. The continents are the result of tectonic activitiy known as "continent building."

And there has been more than one "super continent." Pangea was the most recent. Before that most of the continental surface was lumped together in a land mass known as Rodinia before breaking up and then reforming into Pangea.

Also, the age of the earth is determined - not by the fossil record but by radiometric dating. The only way to confuse radiometric dating is to either "restart the clock" by making your rock samle superheat lava again or by introducing pressuses that will overcome nuclear forces and refuse the atoms. We have no way of doing that with the heavier atoms anywhere on the surface of the earth.

To refuse atoms you need to be in the core of a star - or more ideally, for the heavier elements, you need to be in the shock wave of a supernova. The earth has obviously never been exposed to either of those conditions.

[pelathais]

Just some more points on "fossil making." Fossil fuels do require heat and pressure to carbonize the material. This process can be sped up a bit in the lab but the result is generally too high in sulfur content to be economically useful as fuel.

The fossil remains of critters and man are the result of a longer process. The biological material is replaced by minerals deposited as a solution in water. Heat and pressure are not always a factor - though there are often fossils found that have been warped and stretched out of shaped as the rocks around them have gone through the process of metamorphosis.

[pelathais]

Originally Posted by Timmy

Um, sure. I guess so. But we'd have to deal with the breakup of the supercontinent, and fast. The violence of a fast breakup (even if it's on the order of a thousand years) would be unimaginable. Earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis that would wipe out mankind (again!). And God would have to tamper with the evidence, to make it look like it never even happened. Like these guys:

...

I had a prof in Bible College who believed (at that time) that Genesis 10:25 was a reference to continental drift and the break up of Pangaea in a single generation. For some reason he accepted Pangaea but rejected Rodina.

I asked him in class one day how humans or any creature could have possibly survived such a cataclysm. He was speechless for several moments. Years later he published a book on the topic that follows ICR's hypothesis of the land being "divided" in a single year during the flood.

The recent tsunamis were caused by a landslide and a single portion of a fault line popping up a couple of meters underwater. Enough water was displace in Indonesia to cause devastation as far away as Africa. Can you imagine the displacement and resulting wave action caused by the Atlantic Ocean forming in a single year long flood?

[Crispus]

Originally Posted by Scott Hutchinson

Was the great flood in Genesis local or global ?
What say ye ?

Hello. I've done a lot of research on this topic and found there's a lot of evidence for a global flood.

Originally Posted by pelathais

Luke 10:25-37 - Did this "certain man" really travel from Jerusalem to Jericho where he "fell among theives" and was rescued by a good Samaritan? Did it really happen? No.

Matthew 5:30 - If you really believed the Bible to be "true" and to be taken literally you would place baskets in your churches to receive the hands, feet and eyeballs of every single member of your local church.

Jesus didn't say, "I'm only kidding here, guys!" Jesus didn't say, "Hey! It's a parable!" Jesus said - "CUT IT OFF!"

It's true that Jesus didn't say it's only a parable but it's understood that he was speaking figuratively. The fact that he was speaking figuratively isn't relevant to the question about whether or not the flood was local or global.

Originally Posted by pelathais

Why are you a "cafeteria Christian?" Why do you skip through the Bible picking and choosing what verses to believe and what to allegorize?

Those who believe the flood is global don't pick and choose which passages are allegory and which are literal. Why only the flood? Why not other stories in the O.T. like David and Goliath or the walls of Jericho?

Originally Posted by pelathais

Because He knows you have better sense that to behave so foolishly. So also is it with the 6,000 year old earth and the "global flood." God is actually hoping that you will wake up and pay attention to the world around you enough to behave wisely and not foolishly.

If that were the case he would have made it clear that it was a local flood and not global. Ha'aretz or erets can mean either land or earth and one should examine the context to see how it should be translated.

If the flood of Genesis was local why didn't Noah and his family take a long journey away from the flood region?

If it was a localized flood why did God command Noah to bring birds on the ark when they could have flown to an area safe from flood waters?

God brought animals to the ark so why didn't make birds that couldn't travel long distances in a short time leave the area over a long period of time?

Why didn't God make the animals travel away from the flood area until it was safe to return?

How much area would be affected by 40 days of continuous rain?

Why did it take so long for the flood waters to recede or assuage?

Genesis 7:11 says all the fountains of the great deep burst forth. Why would this be relevant if the flood was only local?

If the flood was local why didn’t people on the outskirts of the flood area go toward an area where there were clear skies?

Why didn’t other people with sturdy boats or ships simply sail away from the region to dry land?

Why did God allow the people and animals to be on the ark for over a year until he told Noah they could leave?

How do you explain Genesis 6:17?

I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish? (NIV)

How does a local flood fit with Isaiah 54:9?

"To me this is like the days of Noah, when I swore that the waters of Noah would never again cover the earth. So now I have sworn not to be angry with you, ever to rebuke you again. (NIV)

Originally Posted by pelathais

And, there is a huge amount of data to show that the human race has gone through at least 2 incredibly narrow genetic bottlenecks. These two events were so severe that the entire human population was reduced to just a single female and (obviously) a single male breeding pair. Kind of odd - whatever the circumstances, it's really quite odd. But there it is.

Scientific data showing genetic bottlenecks, or the lack of them, is based on studies done with Mitochondrial DNA. I have read statements from several scientists who questioned if recombination can occur in different species. There have been studies which show that recombination does occur in different species and, not surprisingly, the most debated one had to do with primates. The PCR technique began in 1987 and, in a biology book published in 1986, I read that said sometimes recombination does occur.

A poster on another board said "You also know that there's no genetic bottleneck in every land species, let alone bottlenecks every one of which dates to 2,348 BCE (or to any other single date)"

Pelathais do you know if that statement is true? If the theory of evolution is true wouldn't there be genetic bottlenecks in every species at some date even if the bottleneck was millions of years ago?

"Regardless of the cause, evolutionists are most concerned about the effect of a faster mutation rate. For example, researchers have calculated that “mitochondrial Eve”—the woman whose mtDNA was ancestral to that in all living people—lived 100,000 to 200,000 years ago in Africa. Using the new clock, she would be a mere 6,000 years old."

(Calibrating the Mitochondrial Clock by Ann Gibbons, Science, January 2, 1998) - The Demise of Mitochondrial Eve

Gibbons paper can be read at http://www.dnai.org/teacherguide/pdf...e_romanovs.pdf

[Crispus]

Originally Posted by pelathais

They are working on that goal because evolution is simply the best explanation for the data that we have.

I used to believe in evolution but after reading a lot about it from both creationists and evolutionists I have totally abandoned the theories of abiogenesis and evolution; the latter can't be true if the former isn't true and it's definitely not true. I cannot put my complete trust in scientists, no matter how brilliant, if bias and philosophy effect their judgment and if they're commited to a belief system which obviously is often the case. Creationists have probably pointed out the various results of C-14 tests to you such as living organisms being dated as thousand of years old. When scientists prove (not theorize) that the C-14 in coal was formed within the last X thousands of years even though the coal itself is 290 mya or older then I'll take what they say about dating seriously.

Originally Posted by pelathais

There is no geologic evidence that the entire land mass of the earth was covered by water at any time in the last 10,000 years. Nor for that matter - for the last 3.5 billion years.

No evidence. None. And, the Bible doesn't even try and make the case that it was.

If a computer model was made using the evolutionary and geological timeline much, if not all, of the land mass of the earth would have been under water at one time. This includes the Western Cretaceious sea, the Tethy ocean, mountains and other areas which have fossils.

There is no evidence for the RNA world, primordial soup or panspermia. The primoridal soup is an impossibility because amino acids don't form proteins in water they break down in water unless there is a mechanism which is able to do it. It's the chicken and the egg scenario. When amino acids are joined together they make more water compounding the problem. Should we reject all theories of abiogenis since there's no evidence that it happened? If it didn't happen then the theory of evolution is false and the geological record has been misinterpreted.

Originally Posted by pelathais

But there is simply no evidence of a global flood. None. Nada. Nothing. Zip. There is however, a tremendous amount of evidence that something culturally took place at that time. It's not a "broad stretch" when an event like a global flood would have left a huge amount of evidence in its (literal) wake. There is simply no such evidence.

I've posted a lot of evidence for a global flood on other fourms. If anyone wants to read it click here and start at post 50; second post on that page.