That's not the point at all. The point is that reading it literally is leading to different conclusions. I'm accepting, for the purpose of argument, that reading it literally is correct. OK - what does that mean? How old is the universe? How old is the earth? How old is life? Of all the people who read it literally, there are many different answers to those questions. Is that a problem? Is it important? Can reading the Bible literally correct those different beliefs until you all believe the same?

As anyone knows who has sat in a writing class and heard students discuss a piece of literature or a student's composition, every individual is going to have a little (or a lot, as the case may be) different view of what they're reading. There is nothing more frustrating or fascinating than to have to remain silent while 20 different people talk about what they got out of something you wrote.

People are coming to it with all kinds of preconceptions and assumptions, and they are all influenced by their unique life-experiences.

Usually they are not all giving emphasis, or even paying attention, to the same facts or sentences or words. If everyone were paying attention to the whole piece of writing, you would have far fewer differences and conclusions.

This is the same thing that happens, of course, in the reading of the Bible. Most of the time the different conclusions that people come to are the result of an improper reading, faulty logic, a failure to take certain things into account, reading into the passage things that don't belong, etc.

I've seen how this applies to the first few chapters of Genesis by comparing the views of SDAs with those of "Jehovah's Witnesses" and with Roman Catholics (the latter two groups accepting the "days" as periods of many thousands of years).

Reading literally one must say the solar system and the universe were created at the same time - on the Fourth Day - when the sun, the moon, AND the stars were created. And God said, Let there be light in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for sighs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: .... And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, ... Gen 1: 14,16,17

Yet some fundamentalists do not want to believe that. It has been said that people are going to believe what they want to believe, about what the Bible means. That seems to be largely true, although it would be nice to think that some of us only want the find out what is really true even if we have to desert our former beliefs. Perhaps we have no choice over what we believe, having been conditioned by all our past experiences up to this very present moment.

Personally, my belief is that Science is probably right - that the stars are older than 6000 years, and the earth, too. It doesn't make the Bible useless to me. It makes it more useful because I know what it is really about is not scientific origins, thus am not sidetracked (hopefully) from the really important things.

If one is reading an English translation that is true. However Hebrew scholars will point out that the Hebrew allows for the sun, moon and stars having been created earlier and appointed their role on the fourth day.

This is an example of how two different people can read the same passable literally and disagree about what it says. However a person cannot read that the six literal days were anything but six literal days and remain true to the text.

Genesis 1: 16 does not necessarily mean that the stars were made that same day. "The stars also" is very possibly similar to a parenthesis, as if the writer were adding an afterthought, "By the way, He also made the stars," but not necessarily at the same time that He made the sun and the moon.

The phrase is disconnected from the rest of the sentence and lacks a subject and verb. If we say "the stars also" means He made the stars at about the same time that He made the earth, sun and moon, we are making an assumption that is not necessitated by the text itself. It's very possible, then, that we are forcing it to say something that is not intended.

...and so it begins...

Does a first, surface reading ever result in the best understanding of any text?

The creationists I interact with most often are extremely fundamentalists and view me as being liberal. So I am quite familiar with how different people can read Genesis literally and view things differently.

[quote]Those who doubt the reliability of the records of the Old and New Testaments, will be led to go a step farther, and doubt the existence of God; and then, having lost their anchor, they are left to beat about upon the rocks of infidelity."/quote]

I'm sure this was posted as a general warning, but do see it as going away from subject to a more 'fear' tactic that is used when ever people start to ask questions. Example, I do not see Bravus as ever denying God or His works of creation.

There is obviously a lot that we do not understand about the beginning of this world and the universe. Science is continuing to exam and propose new theories all the time as a way of understanding. We would be in the dark ages still without science. We must also remember that humans were created with an inquiring mind and the ability to choose. If someone wants to take a very fundamental view of the whole process, so be it! If an other wants to take a more open view of it, okay! Neither side has the answers, so why not continue to examine. As has been said by others, believing in one not does negate the other. Down through the ages religion has always looked at science with fear. Although their can be a danger in a total trust of science for all answers, a true faith and trust in God, should not lead to a fear or distrust of science. I would propose that perhaps a persons faith and trust in God needs to be strengthened so as to not always to be in fear.

"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."
--Galileo Galilei