Creationist In White House

How long have we been on the earth?

Well  the Christian scholars in bible studies (Bishop Usher et al).....have always said about 6,000 years old (as do many 'intelligent design' proponents as they are largely one and the same groups) ... Sunday, October 23, 4004 BC to be precise (although other Bible  scholars have come up with date ranges of 3761 BC (Jose ben Halafta), 3952 BC (the venerable Bede), and 3949 BC (Usher's near-contemporary Scaliger), even scientists such as Johannes Kepler or Sir Isaac Newton  had a go (c 3992 BC and c. 4000 BC respectively).

Modern science on the other hand, puts the age of the Earth as billions of years, and modern humanity alone in the hundreds of thousands of years (that's ignoring the Neanderthals and earlier direct lineage human species). The latest reports on rock art in Spain and Portugal dates some of it at about 40,000 years ago.

40,000 yr Old Hand Rock Art - Spain

Now either the science is just completely and utterly wrong, and the world was created around 6,000 years ago, or the creationists are complete nut cases (I know what I think). What makes this interesting is that all US Presidents have to profess a belief in a God (usually Christian .... although many still believe that Obama is a secret Muslim), but can't actually say out loud whether they believe the Bible is right or wrong on the matter.

Creationist Noah and His Ark Full Of Dinosaurs

This belief in the creationist theory rises significantly the more Protestant the Christians get. So for example in the US only 8% of Jehovahs Witnesses believe in the theory of Evolution, and only 22% of Mormons .....  which means that about 20% of Americans claim that the Bible is the only correct explanation for the origin of the Earth and humans. ... we have plenty of these creationists here in the UK, but they only ever turn up on blogs and discussion websites.

But what makes this really interesting is that Mitt Romney, Republican Presidential nominee, is from a very high profile and important Mormon family (his great, great grandfather Miles was one of the earliest converts to Mormonism in England in 1837) ... maybe he will be the first to go public and declare himself a creationist?

Garden Of Eden Found

Here is an interesting story featured on another blog site called Bayou Renaissance Man ...... Its concerning archaeological discoveries at Gobekli Tepe in Turkey. The original story source seems to be the Daily Mail newspaper in the UK, and the blogger has his own take on it, as well as following up on his first blog with an expanded view......

The story has correlations with the Bibles 'Garden of Eden' tale which is fair enough, as the site archaeologist Klaus Schmidt has made the connection. "In the Book of Genesis, it is indicated that Eden is west of Assyria. Sure enough, this is where Gobekli is sited. Likewise, biblical Eden is by four rivers, including the Tigris and Euphrates. And Gobekli lies between both of these. In ancient Assyrian texts, there is mention of a 'Beth Eden' - a house of Eden. This minor kingdom was 50 miles from Gobekli Tepe".

Another book in the Old Testament talks of 'the children of Eden which were in Thelasar', a town in northern Syria, near Gobekli. The very word 'Eden' comes from the Sumerian for 'plain'; Gobekli lies on the plains of Harran. It was built around 10,000 BC. By comparison, Stonehenge was built in 3,000 BC and the pyramids of Giza in 2,500 BC.

The story highlights the fact that carbon-dating indicates that the temple complex is at least 12,000 years old, and maybe even as old as 13,000 years old. This takes it into the Neolithic period and well before the date the intelligent designer (aka God) is supposed to have created the Earth on (6,000 BC).

The carvings (seen here with Klaus Schmidt) are highly sophisticated, and the scale is somewhat reminiscent of the Malta temples (below) although much earlier.

 

On a side note ... I have noticed before that a lot of US blogger's quote from UK newspapers, and if any American can tell me if there is a particular reason for this - maybe US newspapers don't cover these kinds of stories? I would appreciate it.