The Days of Creation Week, How Long Were They?
By F. A. Buzzell
Some tell us that from a geological stand-point they must have been periods of time, embracing millions of years; others, getting their authority from the same source, say they were periods of one thousand years; again, another class affirm them to have been days of, to us, indefinite time, and this conclusion, too, is drawn from geological facts. Still another class, from a Bible stand-point, claim those days to have been of twenty-four hours duration. Men who in interpreting God's word give credence to a secondary sense are great sticklers for reason and natural laws; and we propose in this article to briefly consider the language relative to those days in the light of reason and natural law, and abide the result. We will not attempt to enter into the questions of rocks, strata, and fossils, but into less intricate and more comprehensive ones. Passing down the inspired record of Genesis to that of the third day, we read that in it were created the grass, herbs, trees, and fruits. In the fourth day the sun, moon, and stars were appointed their places and operations. Upon the fifth day the fowls of heaven and creatures of the waters commenced life. The cattle, beasts of the earth, and every creeping thing, received their structures and breath of life from their Creator upon the sixth day, as also did man, the crown of God's creative work. Now, let us apply the thousand-year theory to the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth days, and see if the voice of reason and of nature will allow its application. Question. What was the purpose in the creative work of the third day? Answer. To supply food for creatures which should afterward need it. Q. How long from the creation of the grass, herb, and fruit, to its use? A. One thousand years at least, per theory, as the fowls of heaven and creatures of the waters were created on the fourth day; and two thousand years or more to its use by the cattle, beasts of the earth, and creeping things. Reason says that to allow such lengths of time to intervene between the preparation of food and its use is an impeachment of the wisdom of the Creator. Natural laws are as much at variance with the application of this theory as is reason. The evening and the morning were the day. Gen. 1:5. (The record must determine the divisions of the one thousand years.) Who does not know the effect which the light and heat emanating from the sun has upon the vegetable kingdom? Can grass grow, or grains or fruits grow or ripen in protracted darkness? Nature answers emphatically, No! Then what, short of a direct miracle, could have brought sustenance to the fowls of heaven and the fishes of the sea upon the morning of the fourth and fifth days (if they could live to that time) after each of the two periods of five hundred years of darkness? And what would be the condition of the animal world, including man, as the five centuries of darkness rolled away, upon the morning of the seventh day? Nature and reason answer, Verily vegetable and animal life would have been swept into oblivion hundreds of years before that morning dawned. Such are the results of this geological theory. Reduce its hundreds of years, even to one year, and the result is disastrous, and subversive of divine wisdom. We might carry the matter much farther in regard to these geological theories, but pass to another point. When we return75and read from the inspired record of the six days of creation, and take God at his word, in all these appointments we see displayed a beautiful harmony, wonderful consistency, and unfathomable wisdom; and view with amazement the matchless simplicity of this narrative of the creation of the heavens and the earth. But, says one, will you set aside actual facts of science and statements of men of profound research in the science of geology? We answer, No, and yes. We will not set aside facts of science,—let us have them thick and fast. But we must set aside statements of men when they contradict God's word and themselves too. Why should Bible believers accept any learned man's Ipse dixit which his tutor or classmate will not accept? The world is full of the blunders of scientists,—their wrecks are strewn on every coast; and while they wrangle and dispute and show no signs of agreement shall we not stand on solid rock rather than embark upon their crafts of straw?