Fun question about the Fall of Adam and dinosaurs

[Valke2]

Hope this doesn’t start any eyes rolling. I’ve just been pondering this and it’s really fascinating to me as a believer. I think it’s really amazing to consider the possibility of a young earth.

Before the Fall, there was no such thing as death, no chaos, no suffering. I’m pretty sure the Church teaches that all of Creation (including the entire Universe) was in a state of incorruption, and that the Fall caused it to be subject to death and suffering. If 500 million years ago there were enormous, horrifying reptiles killing one another like crazy on this planet, wouldn’t the Church also have to assume that man’s state of justice pre-existed the dinosaurs?

Whether this means that man is much older than we think, or the earth/universe is much younger than we think; would it also mean that the Church would necessarily believe that man and dinosaur walked the earth at the same time?

How do those scientists measure all these 500 million year time spans anyway? Carbon dating?

I’m serious!

Wasn’t there chaos before God formed the world?

 

[Struggling]

Yes, science has gotten arrogant and mocks religion unnecessarily…not understanding the difference between the physical and the metaphysical, not even understanding the terminology we use when talking.

BUT just because science has gotten prideful…doesn’t mean we need to dismiss it entirely or throw the baby out with the bathwater.

When they’re right, they’re right.

If I remember my Scripture correctly, God created the world 6 days BEFORE Adam. I don’t see why you care if the universe was created 6 days before or 12 billion years before. The point was, it existed before Adam…and animals did too…and they likely were mortal before Adam existed because they had teeth designed for eating each other etc…

Sounding like idiots just to defy science’s pride, is pointless. We can resist them with intellectual robustness, we don’t need to just act like rebellious teens and revolt against everything they say as if that somehow preserves religion. THAT makes us look like we are on the defensive (and a desperate defensive at that) which we are not.

I concede that it’s inappropriate to search into such high matters which are utterly beyond our comprehension.

No. I think you’re missing my point. The point is that Animal Death ISN’T a “high matter” or “utterly beyond our comprehension”. It is an utterly MUNDANE issue. That’s why I think the whole conversation is so silly. ANIMALS DIE. There is nothing more to it. That’s one of things that has always seperated us from them. They are mortal. It’s no mystery, no high matter…it’s just that animals die and always have. It is a minor point that doesn’t need to be (and doesn’t deserve to be) explained by any sort of quantum past-changing nonsense. God just made them that way, end of story.

 

[DesertBrother]

Yes, science has gotten arrogant and mocks religion unnecessarily…not understanding the difference between the physical and the metaphysical, not even understanding the terminology we use when talking.

BUT just because science has gotten prideful…doesn’t mean we need to dismiss it entirely or throw the baby out with the bathwater.

When they’re right, they’re right.

If I remember my Scripture correctly, God created the world 6 days BEFORE Adam. I don’t see why you care if the universe was created 6 days before or 12 billion years before. The point was, it existed before Adam…and animals did too…and they likely were mortal before Adam existed because they had teeth designed for eating each other etc…

Sounding like idiots just to defy science’s pride, is pointless. We can resist them with intellectual robustness, we don’t need to just act like rebellious teens and revolt against everything they say as if that somehow preserves religion. THAT makes us look like we are on the defensive (and a desperate defensive at that) which we are not.

No. I think you’re missing my point. The point is that Animal Death ISN’T a “high matter” or “utterly beyond our comprehension”. It is an utterly MUNDANE issue. That’s why I think the whole conversation is so silly. ANIMALS DIE. There is nothing more to it. That’s one of things that has always seperated us from them. They are mortal. It’s no mystery, no high matter…it’s just that animals die and always have. It is a minor point that doesn’t need to be (and doesn’t deserve to be) explained by any sort of quantum past-changing nonsense. God just made them that way, end of story.

Wow, you’re really upset. Cheer up and go drink some egg nog! We’re all brothers in Christ here. Let’s just end the arguing please and focus on our Lord’s birth. In case you missed it the first time, I’ll say it once again: Merry Christmas!

 

[Steven_Merten]

Yes, science has gotten arrogant and mocks religion unnecessarily…not understanding the difference between the physical and the metaphysical, not even understanding the terminology we use when talking.

BUT just because science has gotten prideful…doesn’t mean we need to dismiss it entirely or throw the baby out with the bathwater.

When they’re right, they’re right.

If I remember my Scripture correctly, God created the world 6 days BEFORE Adam. I don’t see why you care if the universe was created 6 days before or 12 billion years before. The point was, it existed before Adam…and animals did too…and they likely were mortal before Adam existed because they had teeth designed for eating each other etc…

Sounding like idiots just to defy science’s pride, is pointless. We can resist them with intellectual robustness, we don’t need to just act like rebellious teens and revolt against everything they say as if that somehow preserves religion. THAT makes us look like we are on the defensive (and a desperate defensive at that) which we are not.

Hello Struggling,

Who said I “defy” or even question any of what science states about the tens of billions of years past that God created thousands or tens of thousands of years ago? I do not. Until Hawking started belittling God’s word on creation, I was amaized and delighted at what he had to say.

I hear from hords of Catholics and other Christians who believe that science has proven God’s Word on creation wrong. I have even heard people condemn Christians as ignorant for believing in God’s Word on creation. No one in Church leadership sees this as a threat to the Church? Why on earth should we Catholics, with the imense creating Power of our God have to remain silent as science-only minded people steam roller over us? We do not have to remain silent with the Power of God’s Word behind us!

The message from God in Genisis is that free willed, love for God capable, man is at the center of creation. Creation flows outward into the past and future physical time from God’s, (who exists outside of physical time), focus point of love for God capable created man. Man is not some speck in the in the created cosmos. Love for God capable man is front and center at the focus point of God’s creation of the cosmos. God looks at the whole of Creation (infinite past through infinte future) as a human looks at a three inch peice of yarn. God’s three inch peice of yarn (creation) flows out into existance from the focus point of love for God capable man.

Merry Christmass to all my brothers and sisters at CAF forms. I will be signing off till after Christmass. Keep on posting Struggling, DesertBrother and all. I will catch up after Christmass.

Meeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyy Christmass to all!

 

[Struggling]

A “past created ten thousand years ago” sounds a little crazy. It depends if you mean it actually or metaphorically. Because the statement has no meaning actually. If God is outside of time, and he creates a past…it would be logically impossible to say that the “past” was made all at once with Adam, because even if you are positing some sort of retrospective action…it’s still Time past, and it is impossible to say “when” it came into existence in a literal way.

But if you mean that Man is the center of creation and God created it for that reason, you are right. But that would not start at the Creation of Adam, according to Catholic thought: the Passion of Christ is the Center of History, not the creation of Adam.

 

[Steven_Merten]

A “past created ten thousand years ago” sounds a little crazy. It depends if you mean it actually or metaphorically. Because the statement has no meaning actually. If God is outside of time, and he creates a past…it would be logically impossible to say that the “past” was made all at once with Adam, because even if you are positing some sort of retrospective action…it’s still Time past, and it is impossible to say “when” it came into existence in a literal way.

But if you mean that Man is the center of creation and God created it for that reason, you are right. But that would not start at the Creation of Adam, according to Catholic thought: the Passion of Christ is the Center of History, not the creation of Adam.

Hello Struggling,

Exellent point! I believe your point confirms that our spiritual God exists outside of physical time.

If a scientist looks back a hundred trillion, gazzillion years ago, the physical time period that he would be looking at would have Jesus enthrowned at the right hand of the Father, ruling over this period. Scripture tells us that Jesus is enthrowned at the right hand of the Father at His ressurection. Christ’s spiritual enthrownment flows out from a specific period in physical time, His death and ressurection, to all eternity from before creation to beyond the end of physical time.

At His ressurection, Jesus asks the Father, “Do you now, Father, give me glory at your side, a glory I had with you before the world began.” Jesus does put His ressurection, acention and enthrownment at the right hand of the Father, 2000 years ago, as before creation.

Christ’s spiritual rule over the physical world for all eternity from before creation to beyond the end of time, given to Him by the Father at His ressurection, is truly without a physical begining end or a physical ending end. Christ’s spritual enthrownment at the right hand of the Father flows out from a specific period in physical time, which is the point of His death and ressurection. Matter, energy and empty space flowing out into physical existance from a specific period in physical time, the time of Adam, would be a similiar spiritual to physical world interaction.

Jesus’ enthrownment at the right hand of the Father at His resurection is before the creation of the cosmos. Your point is true.

NAB JOH 17:4

“I have given you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. Do you now, Father, give me glory at your side, a glory I had with you before the world began.” NAB REV 1:17

" . . . I am the First and the Last and the One who lives. Once I was dead but now I live forever and ever. . . ." NAB HEB 1:5 Messianic Enthronement.

To which of the angels did God ever say, “You are my son; today I have begotten you”? Or again, “I will be his father, and he shall be my son”? And again, when he leads his first-born into the world, he says, “Let all the angels of God worship him.” **NAB PSA 2:7 **

The LORD said to me, 'You are my son; this day I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will give you the nations for an inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possession.

NAB ACT 13:32

“We ourselves announce to you the good news that what God promised our fathers he has fulfilled for us, their children, in raising up Jesus, according to what is written in the second psalm, You are my son; this day I have begotten you.” **NAB MAT 28:18 **

Jesus came forward and addressed them in these words: “Full authority has been given to me both in heaven and on earth. . . .”
NAB ACT 2:33

"Exalted at God’s right hand, he first received the promised Holy Spirit from the Father, then poured this Spirit out on us. This is what you now see and hear. David did not go up to heaven, yet David says,

‘The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. Therefore let the whole house of Israel know beyond any doubt that God has made both Lord and Messiah this Jesus whom you crucified.’"
NAB LUK 1:30

The angel went on to say to her: “Do not fear, Mary. You have found favor with God. You shall conceive and bear a son and give him the name Jesus. Great will be his dignity and he will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his father. He will rule over the house of Jacob forever and his reign will be without end.”

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

Human Death and the Fall of Adam Table 4.2: The Early Church Fathers View of the Original State of Adam and Eve.

Church Father, Date, Was Man Mortal before the Fall? Reference

Justin Martyr c.100-c.165 NO Dialogue 124.

Tatian 110-180 No Address 7.

Theophilus of Antioch c.180 Yes Autolycus 2.27

Irenaeus of Lyons c.115-202 No Demonstration 15

Clement of Alexandria c.150-c.215 Yes Miscellanies 3.9

Tertullian c.160-c.225 NO Testimony 3

Methodius d. 311 No Chastity, 3.7; 9.2

Athanasius c.300-373 No Incarnation 3, 4.

Gregory of Nyssa 300-394 NO Moses 44.397; cf. 45.33

John Chrysostom 374-407 No Genesis 8.4; 15.4; 16.6.

Theodore of Mopseustia c.350-428 Yes Galatians 2.15, 16.

Augustine of Hippo 354-430 Yes Literal 8.4.8-8.5.11; 9.10.16-18; 11.18.23-24

F.R. Tennant, The Sources of the Doctrines of the Fall and Original Sin. (New York: Schocken Books, 1968), 273-342.

Table 4.2 gives an summary of the opinions of the early church fathers regarding the original state of Adam and Eve.

However, the situation is more complicated than this might indicate. By the time of Augustine there were at least three views evident in the literature of the Church:

Adam was created immortal. This was the majority view, held by Justin Martyr, Tatian, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Methodius, Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa and John Chrysostom.

Adam and Eve were created mortal and were to become immortal after a period of probation in the garden. This view was held by Theophilus of Antioch. Augustine held to a variation of this view in which the bodies of Adam and Eve, though created mortal, were preserved from decay and lustful desires by being able to feed on the Tree of Life. Exclusion from the Tree of Life after the Fall therefore resulted in human death. Had Adam and Eve not fallen they would have received what we know as resurrection bodies.

Mortality is part of God’s plan and is not a direct result of the Fall. This view was held by Clement of Alexandria and Theodore of Mopseustia.

robibrad.demon.co.uk/Chapter4.htm

Reply to Objection 2. This likeness of man to other animals regards a condition attaching to matter, namely the body being composed of contraries. But it does not regard the form, for man’s soul is immortal, whereas the souls of dumb animals are mortal.

newadvent.org/summa/3164.htm

newadvent.org/search/?safe=active&cx=000299817191393086628%3Aifmbhlr-8x0&q=dumb+animals+image+God&cof=FORID%3A9#955

Mankind is made in God’s image, animals are not made in God’s image. So, it is possible that animals experienced death before the fall. Plants were eaten, thus they died. If bacteria did not die, Adam and Eve would be foaming at the mouth so to speak. If no decay, then where did Adam and Eve put their human waste products?

Think about a world with no decay, what are the implications? How did Adam and Eve digest food? Without decay there is no growth, so how did they grow food?

 

[AndrewA]

First of all, God created the world aged. Just he made Adam a MAN not a BABY. Second of all I believe that the Paradise was only a part of the world like one island… So who’s to say Dino’s didn’t exist far away from Adam as well as close to him?

 

[Steven_Merten]

Mankind is made in God’s image, animals are not made in God’s image. So, it is possible that animals experienced death before the fall. Plants were eaten, thus they died. If bacteria did not die, Adam and Eve would be foaming at the mouth so to speak. If no decay, then where did Adam and Eve put their human waste products?

Think about a world with no decay, what are the implications? How did Adam and Eve digest food? Without decay there is no growth, so how did they grow food?

Hello Daniel,

What are your thoughts on my post #65 ?

What would the past, infinitely beyond the dinasour, look like had Jesus failed 2000 years ago? We know that Jesus is exalted at God’s right hand upon His death and ressurection. We know that, once Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, the infinte past and infinite future of physical time has Christ seated at the right hand of the Father. God exists outside of physical time.

What would the physical past of our world look like had free-willed Jesus failed in His battle with Satan 2000 years ago? What if Jesus had failed to rob the devil of his power by choosing not the path of His passion, ressurection and exaltation at God’s right hand? We know that at least past prophesies would be different in the past of physical time. No doubt the past of the physical world as a whole, to the dinasours and beyond would be quite different.

St. Paul relates the fall of Adam with the obedience of Jesus and how these two events effect us. If Jesus had freely chosen not to lay down his life for mankind 2000 years ago, how would that have effected Adam and the dinasours? Would the dinasours have Christ exalted at God’s right hand, had Jesus freely chosen not to die on the cross 2000 years ago?

Does it not seem logical that the whole big picture, from beyond infinite past to beyond infinite future, changes according to free-willed choices to God’s will rather than just bacteria not dying one minuet and then dying the next minute, after the fall of man?

Please visit Jesus Loves God
NAB LUK 22:42

"Father, if it is your will, take this cup from me; yet not my will but yours be done."NAB HEB 4:14

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who was tempted in every way that we are, yet never sinned.
NAB HEB 2:14
Now, since the children are men of blood and flesh, Jesus likewise had a full share in ours, that by his death he might rob the devil, the prince of death, of his power, and free those who through fear of death had been slaves their whole life long. Surely he did not come to help angels, but rather the children of Abraham; therefore he had to become like his brothers in every way, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest before God on their behalf, to expiate the sins of the people. **Since he was himself tested through what he suffered, he is able to help those who are tempted.**NAB ISA 7:14

Therefore the LORD himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel. He shall be living on curds and honey by the time he learns to reject the bad and choose the good. NAB ROM 5:18

To sum up, then: just as a single offense brought condemnation to all men, a single righteous act brought all men acquittal and life. Just as through one man’s disobedience all became sinners, so through one man’s obedience all shall become just.
NAB JOH 10:17

“The Father loves me for this: that I lay down my life to take it up again. No one takes it from me; I lay it down freely.” NAB JOH 15:12

This is my commandment: love one another as** I have loved you. There is no greater love than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.** You are my friends if you do what I command you.**NAB JOH 14:30 **

“I shall not go on speaking to you longer; the Prince of this world is at hand. He has no hold on me, but the world must know that **I love the Father and do as the Father has commanded me.” **NAB JOH 4:34

“Doing the will of him who sent me and bringing his work to completion is my food.”