God took six days to create the earth. Why six days? Why not six minutes or six seconds. The following comes from the book "The New Answers Book" by Ken Ham.
" Exodus 31:12 says that God commanded Moses to say to the children of Israel:
"Six days may work be done, but on the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Therefore the sons of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant. It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested, and was refreshed (Exodus 31:15-17)."
Then God gave Moses two tablets of stone upon which were written the commandments of God, written by the finger of God (Exodus 31:18).
Because God is infinite in power and wisdom, there's no doubt He could have created the universe and its contents in no time at all, or six seconds, or six minutes, or six hours - after all, with God nothing shall be impossible (Luke 1:37).
However, the question to ask is, "Why did God take so long? Why as long as six days?" The answer is also given in Exodus 20:11, and that answer is the basis of the fourth Commandment:
"For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it."
The seven - day week has no basis outside of Scripture. In this Old Testament passage, God commands His people, Israel, to work for six days and rest for one - thus giving us a reason why He deliberately took as long as six days to create everything. He set the example for man. Our week is patterned after this principle. Now if He created everything in six thousand (or six million) years, followed by a rest of one thousand or one million years, then we would have a very interesting week indeed.
Some say that Exodus 20:11 is only an analogy in the sense that man is to work and rest - not that is was to mean six literal ordinary days followed by one literal ordinary day. However, Bible scholars have shown that this commandment "does not use analogy or archetypal thinking but that its emphasis is 'stated in terms of the imitation of God or a divine precedent that is to be followed.'" In other words, it was to be six literal days of work, followed by one literal day of rest, just as God worked for six literal days and rested for one.
Some have argued that "the heavens and the earth" is just earth and perhaps the solar system, not the whole universe. However, this verse clearly says that God made "everything" in six days - six consecutive ordinary days.
The phrase Heavens and earth" in Scripture is an example of a figure of speech called a "merism", where two opposites are combined into an all-encompassing single concept, in this case the totality of creation. A linguistic analysis of the words "heavens and earth" in Scripture shows that they refer to the totality of all creation (the Hebrews did not have a word for "universe"). For example, in Genesis 14:19 God is called "Creator of heaven and earth." In Jeremiah 23:24 God speaks of Himself as "filling heaven and earth..."
There is no scriptural warrant for restricting Exodus 20:11 to earth and its atmosphere or the solar system alone. So Exodus 20:11 does show that the whole universe was created in six ordinary days.
As the days of creation are ordinary days in length, then by adding up the years of Scripture (assuming no gaps in the genealogies*), the age of the universe is only about six thousand years. "
* Note; J. Whitcomb and H. Morris, "The Genesis Flood" states: they allow for the possibility of gaps in the genealogies because the word "begat" can skip several generations.
By George Konig
8/19/2007
www.georgekonig.org
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