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This question is made from the perspective of Old Earth Creationism (OEC), especially that espoused by Hugh Ross at reasons.org. I have also created a website at big.bible to explore these questions more fully. Many of the books of Hugh Ross (e.g., Navigating Genesis) make the point that the sequence of events described in Genesis 1 follows very closely to the sequence of events that scientists have discovered about the evolution of the earth and earth's forms of plant and animal life over the last 4.5 billion years. If this is really true, it would mean that the writer of Genesis 1 would almost certainly have received this knowledge from the Creator since Genesis 1 was written over 3000 years ago when there would have been no natural way to know the exact sequence of events over the last 4.5 billion years. That 4.5 billion year sequence has only been put together by scientists in the last several hundred years. Put in another way, if this description of the scientific sequence of events of the last 4.5 billion years was accurately portrayed in Genesis over 3000 years ago, would this more or less prove that the Bible was divinely inspired, meaning that it was written by inspiration from the Creator of the universe?

As a note to those who might say that Genesis is a literary or inspirational document and not a scientific document, I would share the following thoughts. Since the Creator of of the universe is also the Creator of language, then it would seem straightforward for this Creator to make a narrative that could be both scientifically accurate as well as inspiring from a literary perspective. And in so doing, Genesis could then be used for inspiration and guidance for the last several millennia. And now when we can understand the Scriptures from a scientific perspective as well, then that could show even more the Creator's unfathomable intelligence and wisdom. We could then see this correlation between science and Genesis 1 as a new gift that the Creator has given us to marvel even more at His power, wisdom, and majesty.

Finally, although this may sound like an opinion-based question since it supposes an OEC viewpoint, what I am really looking for here is feedback on the logic of this question. It would seem very profound if we could make these claims of an almost scientific proof for the Bible, so on a logical basis I am asking if anyone can see any fallacies in this logic before I begin making such a claim to others.

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    "Genesis 1 follows very closely to the sequence of events that scientists have discovered about the evolution of the earth" ...really? Because Genesis 1 says things like birds were made before land animals, and that plants were made before the sun. And that this all happened in six days. This is contrary to the present scientific "consensus". (Not that said consensus isn't full of flaws, but your premise that Genesis matches said consensus doesn't appear to hold up.)
    – Matthew
    Aug 22, 2022 at 2:17
  • @Matthew - Thanks for taking the time to reply. Your thoughts are similar to mine before I started reading the books by Hugh Ross. One of his insights is based on Genesis 1:2 - "The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters" (ESV). In either scientific or literary terms, there is always a frame of reference. So, this gives us the frame of reference of the Spirit of God hovering over the face of the deep, that is the primordial earth. From that frame of reference, then the 6 days make great sense.
    – bkudrle
    Aug 22, 2022 at 18:00
  • For example, for the 4th day of creation the ESV says "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. " The original Hebrew apparently denotes appearance and not creation. From the perspective of the cloud covered earth, the atmosphere became transparent during the great oxygenation event of the earth around 580 mya. This event was indeed after the emergence of the earliest plant and animal life between 2400 mya and 580 mya. This is the type of correlation to me that seems too coincidental, once we understand the frame of reference from Genesis 1:2.
    – bkudrle
    Aug 22, 2022 at 18:13
  • "It would seem very profound if we could make these claims of an almost scientific proof for the Bible, so on a logical basis I am asking if anyone can see any fallacies in this logic before I begin making such a claim to others." This is flawed reasoning. If you want feedback, pick (one) area of priority and place in comments or new question. There are some things you are missing in the premise of your question.
    – Nathan Priddis
    Aug 25, 2022 at 16:43
  • @NathanPriddis - Thanks for your feedback. Could you be more specific about how the reasoning is flawed and/or the things that I am missing in the premise of my question? Any specifics would be helpful. Thanks.
    – bkudrle
    Aug 26, 2022 at 17:37

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Unfortunately the answer is "no." Even if the author of Gen. 1 received a revelation from God that conforms with the scientific view of creation, this does not prove the divine inspiration of the Bible. At best it would prove the divine inspiration of Gen. 1. But Gen. 2 presents a very different scenario, and there are many other chapters in Genesis and books in the Bible. As the saying goes "even a broken clock is right twice a day." I don't meant to denigrate the Bible by saying so, but I do think the questioner's logic is flawed.

Also, assuming that Genesis indeed "follows very closely to the sequence of events that scientists have discovered" this does not mean that it is the product of divine revelation. It could be a lucky guess.

So the answer is no. The convergence of Gen. 1 with scientific thought at best provides evidence for the divine inspiration of Genesis 1 but does not prove it, and definitely does not prove the divine inspiration of the entire Bible.

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  • Good point that theoretically Genesis 1 could be correct scientifically or otherwise but that does not make the entire Bible correct. Someone would need to have something else in their belief system to justify divine inspiration for all of the Bible. Concerning someone correctly guessing events from creation and then also getting the sequence right, this would seem to be highly improbable. to me, though. Support for the improbability would be that other origin stories that I know of may get one or two or so of the events right, but the rest of their events are usually way off.
    – bkudrle
    Aug 22, 2022 at 21:07
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    I agree that the odds are against guessing correctly. But I also think that for several thousand years, no one interpreted Gen. 1 in the way suggested in the OP. So was it a revelation, or are we simply trying to make it fit with science, when the plain meaning of the human author doesn't fit with the scientific view? I don't have a problem with doing that. I've taught the idea personally to many students but I also have admit it's not what the human author intended.
    – Dan Fefferman
    Aug 22, 2022 at 21:14
  • Yes, I agree that the original author of Genesis probably did not understood the nuances of what he was writing. It makes me wonder, though, if this would put Genesis 1 in a similar category to those prophecies that were not well understood at the time they were written (e.g., Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Daniel 2, Daniel's 70 weeks before the Son of Man, other prophecies about the Messiah, even Paul's remark in Gal. 3:16 about Abraham's seed and not seeds). But this perspective is even more reliant on an acceptance of divine revelation to begin with.
    – bkudrle
    Aug 22, 2022 at 22:00

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