WHY THE GAP THEORY WON'T WORK
by Henry Morris
What is the Gap Theory?
One of the popular devices for trying to accommodate the
evolutionary ages of the geologists and astronomers in the
creation record of the Bible has been the "gap theory"-- also
called the "ruin-and-reconstruction" theory.
According to this concept, Genesis 1:1 describes the initial
creation of the universe. Following this, the standard events of
cosmic evolution took place, which eventually produced our solar
system about five billion years ago. Then, on the earth, the
various geologic ages followed, as identified by their respective
assemblages of fossils (trilobites, dinosaurs, etc.)
But then occurred a devastating global cataclysm, destroying
all life on Earth and leaving a vast fossil graveyard everywhere.
This situation is then said to be what is described in Genesis
1:2, "And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was
upon the face of the deep." The cataclysm is thought to have
occurred as a result of rebellion of Satan and his angels against
their Creator in Heaven, with God then casting them out of Heaven
to the earth.
Those who advocate the gap theory agree that the six days of
creation week were literal days, but they interpret them only as
days of recreation, with God creating again many of the kinds and
animals destroyed in the cataclysm.
What is the Purpose of the Gap Theory?
The gap theory was developed mainly for the purpose of
accommodating the great ages demanded by evolutionary geologists.
This idea was first popularized by a Scottish theologian. Thomas
Chalmers, early in the 19th century. In this country, the famous
Scofield Study Bible made it an almost universally accepted
teaching among fundamentalists.
The Scofield Bible notes on Genesis 1 include the following:
The first act refers to the dateless past, and gives scope
for all the geologic ages... The face of the earth bears
everywhere the marks of such a catastrophe. There are not
wanting intimations which connect it with a previous testing
and fall of angels... Relegate fossils to the primitive
creation, and no conflict of science with the Genesis
cosmogony remains.
However, serious conflicts do remain. In fact, there are few, if
any, professionally trained geologists and astronomers (to my
knowledge there are none) who accept the gap theory. The
promoters of this theory have mostly been Bible teachers who
hoped they could place these great ages in a gap between the
first two verses of Genesis, and thus not have to deal with them
at all.
With the modern revival of scientific Biblical creationism, may
of these teachers have abandoned the gap theory in favor of
strict creationism. Most advocates of the gap idea were men of
strong Biblical faith, and when they were shown its Biblical
fallacies, plus its scientific inadequacies, they were quite
willing to reject the evolutionary ages scheme altogether.
Many of us had naively assumed that the gap theory was
moribund, and so had concentrated most of our critiques on the
other compromise theories (day-day theory, framework theory,
etc.). But now it appears that the gap theory is still being
advocated by a number of evangelical theologians.
For example, the Nelson Study Bible, published this year
(1997), in its footnotes on Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, says:
Here it means that God renewed what was in a chaotic state.
God changed chaos into cosmos, disorder into order,
emptiness into fullness... The two words, without form and
void, express one concept- chaos. The earth had been
reduced to this state- it was not the way God first created
it.
The editors and contributors to this volume-43 in all-
include many well known evangelical leaders. Yet they feel they
must allow for the geological ages, and so they opt for what
amounts to the old gap theory again with its pre-Adamic
cataclysm. The notes in this study Bible do allow a worldwide
Flood, but there are no relevant comments on the effects of sin
and the curse on the animal kingdom, and no mention of the
billions of fossils now preserved in the earth's sedimentary rock
beds.
Is the Gap Theory Scientific?
The reason why geologists will not accept the gap theory is that
it contradicts their assumption that the past is continuous with
the present. There is no room in their naturalistic approach to
science for a global cataclysm that would destroy all life and
then require a new creation of plants, animals, and people such
as the gap theory proposes.
Any cataclysm that would leave the earth "without form and
void" (or a shapeless chaotic mass" as The Living Bible expresses
it), with "darkness on the face of the deep" everywhere, would
require a world-wide nuclear or volcanic explosion that would be
blown into the sea and billions of tons of rocks and dust blown
into the atmosphere, leaving the earth covered with "the deep"
everywhere and "darkness" covering the deep everywhere.
Such a cataclysm would disintegrate any previously deposited
sedimentary deposits with their fossils and thus obliterate all
evidence of any previous "geological ages." Thus the gap theory,
which is supposed to accommodate the geological ages, requires a
cataclysm which would destroy all evidence for the geological
ages.
Is it Theologically Sound?
The gap theory is also unsound theologically. The God of
Creation is an omnipotent and omniscient God, and is also a God
of grace, mercy, and love. The very concept of the geological
ages, on the other hand, implies a wasteful and cruel "god" and
therefore probably no god at all.
The supposed geologic ages are identified in terms of the
fossils found in the earth's sedimentary rocks and there are
multiplied billions of them there. But the fossils speak of
death--even violent death. The preservation of dead animals
requires rapid burial if they are to last very long. There are
many regions, for example, where there are millions of fossil
fish preserved in the rocks. There are dinosaur fossil beds on
every continent, as well as great beds of fossil marine
invertebrates practically everywhere. These may indeed speak of
cataclysmic death and burial, but not a cataclysm operating
slowly billions of years, as the geological ages imply. If the
gap theory were valid, it would mean that God had instituted an
ages-long system of suffering and death over the world, before
there were ever any men and women to place dominion over the
world, and then suddenly destroy it in a violent cataclysm. Why
would an omnipotent, merciful God do such a wasteful and cruel
thing as that?
They cannot blame Satan, either. According to the gap
theory, Satan's fall took place at the end of the geological
ages, followed by the great pre-Adamic cataclysm on the earth.
Thus the geological ages, with their eons of cruelty and waste,
took place even before Satan's sin. God Himself would be solely
responsible for the whole debacle, if it really happened.
But in the Gap Theory Biblical?
If the Bible actually teaches the gap theory, however, then there
might be some reason to try to accommodate it in our theology.
But the Bible does not teach it! If there really had been
billions of years of animals suffering and dying before Genesis
!;2, why would God say nothing about it? The best they can offer
in support of such a notion are some out-of-context quotes from
Isaiah and Jeremiah, along with an ad hoc translation of Genesis
1:1,2.
And why would God send such a devastating cataclysm at all?
Satan's fall did not occur until after the creation week of
Genesis 1, for at that time God has pronounced the whole creation
"very good" (Gen.1:31). At present, however, "the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together" (Romans 8:22) because
of the great curse pronounced by God on man's dominion (Genesis
3:17-19), as a result of sin.
This groaning creation has indeed experienced one global
cataclysm--one not inferred from vague hints in out-of-context
quotes, but rather one described in great detail in Genesis 6-9
and referred to often and unambiguously in later passages--
namely, the worldwide Flood in the days of Noah. Most of the
vast fossil graveyards in the earth's crust can best be explained
as one of the results of the Flood.
This awesome spectacle of destruction and death was not part
of God's "very good" creation. There was no death in the world
until sin was in the world (Romans 5:12; I Corinthians 15:21;
etc.). In fact, death itself is "the wages of sin" (Romans
6:23). Our future deliverance from sin and death has been
purchased by the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ, who is
"the propitiation of our sins and ...also for the sins of the
hold world" (John 2:2).
But if "death reigned" not "from Adam to Moses," as the
Bible says (Romans 5:14), but had already reigned for billions of
years before Adam, then death is not the wages of sin but instead
was part of God's creative purpose. How then could the death of
Christ put away sin? The gap theory thus undermines the very
gospel of our salvation, as well as the holy character of God.
The fact is that no such gap exists between the first two
verses of Genesis at all. The second verse merely describes the
initial aspect of creation as "without form and void"--that is,
with neither structure nor inhabitants. The rest of the chapter
tells us how God produced a marvelous structure for His created
universe, with multitudes of plant and animal inhabitants for the
earth, all to be under the dominion of its human inhabitants
created in the image of God. It was only then that God
pronounced the creation "finished" (Genesis 2:1).
It is time for those who believe the Bible and in the
goodness and wisdom of God to abandon the gap theory once and for
all (as well as the day-age theory, which is even worse) and
simply believe what God has said. The gap theory has no
scientific merit, requires a forced Biblical exegesis, and leads
to a God-dishonoring theology. It does not work, either
Biblically or scientifically.
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