Alpha Omega

From science one can learn that the earth obtained the moon from a collision with an asteroid (or comet) before the evolution of life. One can only wonder then, why the ancient prophet of God describes it appearing for the first time on the fourth day after the evolution of life on the third day. How could the Sun and the moon have been created after the first photosynthetic life forms?

However, this is not what is being created at this time. What the ancient priest, with his limited knowledge, is attempting to describe is the evolution of an atmosphere dominated by oxygen over that of carbon dioxide. The gradual clearing of the enshrouding carbon dioxide opens the way for the transition of animal life onto dry land.

The Sun, the moon, and the stars shine down onto a new earth dominated by the vertebrates. But to this ancient prophet’s understanding, God did not clear the sky of the carbon dioxide at this point. Instead, He created these celestial objects at this point in time. This is how the servant of God sees it in his vision of the night and how he understands it. When he woke up, he composed a verse explaining what he believed he saw in his dream.

One cannot deny that the Sun, the moon and the stars were used as signs of the days, the seasons and the years. For example, some evidence seems to suggest that Stonehenge in Salisbury Plain, England was built by ancient man for following celestial movements and that the pyramids of Egypt were built to mimic the stars in the constellation Orion. Today people still use the stars, the moon and the Sun for plotting and charting their way around the earth.

Nor can one claim that the moon is not a light of the night. Although the earth’s only natural satellite does not produce its own light, its reflected light from the Sun does brighten up the black of night. Surely, the moon is the ruling light of the night and the Sun is the ruling light of the day.

Thus, ends the “fourth night and day” as science and the Holy Bible proclaim the same truth.

Biological and paleontological sciences have shown how the very first land animals came out of the fresh water lakes and ponds. From a fish ancestry, the vertebrates evolved into amphibians, creeping across swamps and through damp forests. Then the reptiles began to evolve. Soon after this, the birds developed from an Archaeopteryx ancestry. This is an animal that definitely flies over the earth and under the firmament of the heavens.

Finally, the dinosaurs became the dominate animals of the Mesozoic Era. Some, such as the peculiar looking Pterodactyl, developed wings using skin instead of feathers, similar to the modern bat. Others returned to the water to become great sea monsters; e.g. the monstrous Plesiosauria and beastly Ichthyosauria. Still others developed into the familiar gigantic archosaurs; e.g. Apatosaurus, Ankylosaurus, Triceratops and Stegosaurus.

All these vertebrates of the Mesozoic Era the ancient servant of God describes as best as his limited intellect could do. But this child of God did not know of the flesh-eating Allosaurus, the ferocious Deinonychus (Raptor), the famous Tyrannosaurus Rex and other now extinct dinosaurs.

But he presumably saw in his dream giant sea monsters swimming in the ocean and other giant beasts treading across the land. Therefore, when he awoke the next morning, he composed a verse about what he saw.

When St. Jerome translated those particular verses concerning these brutes, he maintained the same wording: producant aquae reptile animae viventis . . . creavitque Deus cete grandia, et omnem animam viventem atque motabilem. When translated means: “the waters brought forth creeping (or reptilian) animals (or creatures) having life (or full of life) . . . And God created great sea creatures (or large sea animals), and every ( or all) living and moving animal.” Just as science proclaims that all life came from the first living organism in the water, so also does the Holy Bible.

Thus, for the fifth time science and the Holy Bible both proclaim the same truth.

One should note that many bibles translate verse twenty incorrectly saying: “let the waters be filled with many kinds of living beings.” But this is not what the Latin says. St. Jerome used the verb produco which means to bring forward, to bring out, or to produce. It does not mean to be filled with.

Nor is it possible that our Lord wanted these verses to claim that a living being existed at this time. Although the Latin animae viventis and animam viventem can also be translated into English as living beings and living being, respectively, it is doubtful that such is an inspired translation from the Latin, for such is not compatible with science. Living beings do not come into the picture until much later in the earth’s evolutionary history. But if these verses are translated living animals, as an inspired translation would do, then they become compatible with what science says about the creation process.

Next, in verses twenty-four and twenty-five, the ancient prophet says that God created more creeping things and other beasts of the earth. This is rightly so, for the earliest mammals began creeping through the dense forest vegetation during the Mesozoic Era. Then, after the mass extinctions of that era, the mammals soon developed into many diverse and domineering species, including the cattle. Then, following the method that science has discovered, God made man; male and female He created them (v.27). God created His greatest artistic genius: man.

(Again, man evolved as a product of the laws of Natural Selection. God had no direct involvement in this evolution. One states here that God created man only as a literary device.)

Our Lord then tells His creation to increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it (v.28). He also tells man to rule over all the animals and plants and to rule over the entire earth (v.29). This implies that wherever man sets his footprint and upon whatever he places his mark, there he will rule. It does not imply that God appeared to anyone in a vision at that time. It means only that our Lord has given His creation — the earth and everything in it — to all mankind. Which means that man may use this world to make his life easier and happier for himself and for future generations.

All this the ancient priest saw in his sixth night of visions. He saw the land filled with wild and domesticated mammals. He also saw that man had dominance over these animals, over the whole earth and over everything that he touched. Both the Holy Scriptures and science proclaim the above procession of events and both declare that man dominates the land as well as the sea and air.

However, this is in no way an attempt to insinuate that man is biologically different from the animals. The difference between man and the animals is similar to the difference between the chemical actions in living things and of nonliving things — such as the difference between cellular respiration and the oxidation of iron. Which is to say that the difference is more in degree than in kind.

There are animals that exhibit many of the traits that man exhibits. There are animals that have courage, creativity, curiosity, fidelity, dexterity, ingenuity, forethought, friendship, tool use and things of this nature. Man’s distinction is that he has an enhanced ability to use these traits. What man has to do now is to learn to use his intelligence for the betterment of all life on earth. Man has to learn to understand his intelligence and how to use it for the survival of all life.

One should note that God made man to His own image. This is not to insinuate that there is any truth in the heresies of scientific creationism, intelligent design creation or any other fundamentalisitc interpretation of Genesis. Nor that God looks like man, for that would be anthropomorphic.

What it does mean is that men and women have a mind that gives them the ability to think logically and act rationally. When faced with any kind of problem, if men and women follow this procedure, then the solution will be right in front of them. But if they do not follow logic and reason, then the only thing that they can ever hope to accomplish is a poor imitation of the correct answer. Only after repeated attempts will they ever succeed.

This is why our Lord gave His creation to man. God wants to demonstrate what good deeds man can accomplish if he thinks about his problems with a logical mind and acts in a rational manner and what destruction evil can do when such a course of action is not followed by men and women.

Thus, for the sixth time science and the Holy Bible proclaim the same truth.

Before continuing, one must note that the first and second chapters of Genesis overlap a bit. That is, when the bible was finally divided into chapters, in the year 1226, for some reason the last few verses of the ancient servant’s narrative were placed as the first several verses of second chapter. One does not know why the bible was partitioned this manner but they have remained this way ever since. However, such does not interfere with the interpretation presented here. When St. Jerome translated the Holy Scriptures into Latin, he was inspired by our Lord. Therefore, they proclaim what God wanted them to proclaim.

In chapter one God blesses mankind and then gives man his instructions. Our Lord manifested to the ancient prophet in his seventh night of dreams that He was finished creating His masterpiece. Man is God’s magnificent artistic genius. Thus, after blessing mankind, God rested from His work of creating and this is what He revealed to the ancient priest in his visions of the night. Our Lord’s blessing of the seventh day and His resting on the seventh day is also an allusion to the Jewish Sabbath. This shows that a day of rest that is called for in the Jewish law was commissioned from the very beginning of creation.

Finally, one must not believe that just because God was finished with His creating that evolution has come to a standstill. Did the young artist and sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475 - 1564) stop producing works of art after he carved out The David at the age of 29 years? Just as an artist does not stop making works of art because he has produced his masterpiece, so also does evolution continue.

Henceforth, there is no need to pass off the account of the creation in Genesis as a mythical flight of poetic imagery. Nor is there any need to deny the evolution of life and man that science has revealed. Both the Holy Bible and science agree. The only thing one must remember is that the Holy Scriptures give a brief, vague explanation of the creation process, while science gives a more detailed account of the creation of the universe, the earth, life and man.

Now the question about the origin of Ylem, the primordial star and the other questions of the first chapter in this book are answered. God, the Creator of all things, created the universe and then, after the Spirit of God crossed the great gulf that separates His world from this world, He created the first light. Then in successive steps and following the laws of natural science all the galaxies, the stars and star clusters and the other celestial objects and the earth were created.

Now too, the question about the origin of the first life is answered. Our Lord is a living God as one may learn from several verses in the Holy Bible: Job,33:4; Jer.10:10; Lk.20:38. These are only a few examples where the scriptures proclaim God to be the God of life; there are many more. Since our Lord is a living God, He is therefore able to give life to the first living organism and all other life forms.

Then God watches His creation follow the laws of natural science. Through the ages it increases and multiplies, changes and disperses until the finished product — Homo sapiens sapiens — walks the face of the earth. Then our Lord blesses His creation, gives His creation to man and then relaxes and rests from all His activity in order to watch man do what he will with his own surroundings.

Again, this does not mean to imply that those who are proposing a fundamentalistic theory of the creation process are propagating the truth. Both scientific creationism and intelligent design creation are heresies. Nor does this trilogy mean to imply that God interfers with the laws of nature.

Man evolved from an ape-like pedigree over several million years according to the laws of natural selection. These biblical passages of Genesis mean that the earth is man’s domain. Man may use this world and everything in it for whatever he desires and to obtain whatever goal he sets out to reach.

However, this does not imply that God does not care for His own or that our Lord does not intervene to help His children, for He does care and He does help His children. This latter truth will be manifested as this trilogy progresses.

But there is still the question of Homo animus. Who is he? Not only that but now more questions have arisen. Who was Adam? Who was Eve? Where is the garden of Eden? What about Noe, the ark and the great deluge? Chapters two and three of Genesis seem to contradict chapter one. This is to say nothing of the fact that several other opening chapters of Genesis seem to deny laws of natural science. Whoever heard of a woman being made from a man’s rib, a snake talking or someone living to be nine hundred years old? However, one cannot forget that God is a sign of contradiction.

This does not mean that our Lord will contradict Himself — only the evil one and his henchmen do such illogical things. It means that God will only “appear” to contradict Himself. God is only a sign of contradiction; He is not a contradiction. This is so that He may “scatter the proud in the conceit of their heart” (Lk.1:51).

One must have humility and wisdom from God in order to understand His word. To a child of love and wisdom our Lord is true in all His works; He will not contradict Himself.

Therefore, the remaining chapters of Genesis that deal with the creation are quite explainable if one does not demand a scientific explanation — as many are doing — but rather seeks a theological answer. The explanation of the creation that is presented in chapter one of Genesis concerns the origin of man’s physical body. The remaining chapters of Genesis that deal with the creation concerns the origin of man’s soul and the origin of religious truth.

Alpha Omega

A Work of Art