The age of the earth is shown by Extinct radionuclide data is consistent with a 4.55 billion yr. old earth! At the top of the list of radioisotopes which are classified as extinct radionuclides are Plutonium-244 and Samariam-146 with half-lives of 80 Myr and 68 Myr. Could primordial Pu-244 still exist? An attempt to verify this failed in 2012! Interstellar Pu-244 exists! Abundance is miniscule past 50 half-lives and 4.55 billion is about 57 half-lives for Pu-244! Read Wikipedia-Isotopes of Samarium & Plutonium-244.
The King James Version (KJV) and also the New King James Version (NKJV) have translated Daniel 8:14 as "two thousand three hundred days;". But with the New Version they did decide to add a translation note "Lit. evening-mornings". Many other translations before and after it have used the "evenings and mornings" translation. Why the NKJV publishers decide to just use a translation note is a mystery. They did however change 8:26 to "evenings and mornings". The Hebrew is H6153-'eber & H1242-boqer.
Therefore anytime that "'ereb-boqer" appears it can be translated as evenings and mornings including in Genesis 1:5, 1:8, 1:13, 1:19, 1:23, and 1:31 ! Use time instead of day for H3117 yom, BDB def. 1) day, time, year, for each verse, and also in verses 2:2-2x, 2:3, 2:17, 3:5, 3:17 !!
Genesis 1:5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evenings and the mornings were the first time. / And there were evenings and there were mornings, one time.
B: Genesis 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. (KJV)
And so the whole universe was completed. (GNB)
Genesis 2:1 is a key text often not fully understood by many. Literally interpreted it indicates the surface of the earth was totally 100% finished at this time and "very good" and therefore the flood as described in Genesis chapters 6 to 8 did not totally reconfigure the surface of the earth as "global flood" proponents propose! The existence of the Tigris (Hiddekel) and Euphrates (Perath) rivers pre-flood (Gen 2:14) and post-flood (Gen 15:18 & Dan 10:4) show that the deluge did NOT massively change the surface as they propose. Also the two rivers Pison and Gihon (Gen 2:11&13) can be easily identified as modern day Qizil Uzan and Aras/Araxes (Arabic Jaihun)! Use land instead of earth for H776 in the flood story chapters, the post-flood scattering of the people of Genesis 11:8 had not yet occurred ! The TLV (Tree of Life Version) uses earth only 4 times in Genesis chapters 7 through 11; the KJV uses earth 48 times in the same five chapters.
Genesis 6:13 ...Behold, I am about to bring ruin upon them along with the land. (TLV 2014)
A change required for this long list of verses; Gen 6:4, 6:5, 6:6, 6:7, 6:11, 6:12-2x, 6:13-2x, 6:17-2x, 6:20, 7:3, 7:4-2x, 7:6, 7:8, 7:10, 7:12, 7:14, 7:17-2x, 7:18, 7:21-2x, 7:22, 7:23, 7:24, 8:1, 8:3, 8;7, 8:9, 8:11, 8:13, 8:14, 8:17-2x, 8:19, 9:1, 9:2, 9:7, 9:10, 9:13, 9:14, 9:16, 9:17, 9:19, 9:19, 11:1, 11:2, 11:4, 11:8, 11:9, and 41:56.
C: Considering the Biblical History of farming and the timeline:
Gen 3:18-19 ... you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, ...The location and the timeline shown in the figures below show that the "work and painful labor" in growing their food was due to a more adverse climate, a time of ice-age conditions before the flood!!
Gen 3:23 therefore the LORD God expelled the man from the garden of Eden so he would work the ground from which he had been taken.
Gen 4:2 ... Abel was a shepherd, and Cain was a farmer.
Gen 3:17 He told the man, "Because you have listened to what your wife said, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat from it,' cursed is the ground because of you. ...
Gen 5:29 ... whom he named Noah, because he said, "May this one comfort us from our work, from pain that is caused by our manual labor, and from the ground that the LORD has cursed." (ISV)
Gen 9:20 Noah began to be a farmer, and planted a vineyard. (WEB)
Gen 8:21 When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, he told himself, "I will never again curse the land because of human beings—even though human inclinations remain evil from youth—nor will I destroy every living being ever again, as I've done. (ISV)The adverse climate condition was ended as emphasized by Genesis 8:22! The beginning of farming: "There is no doubt that Armenia is the chief home of cultivated wheat. Asia Minor and Trans-Caucasia gave origin to rye which is represented here by a great number of varieties and species.... the home of alfalfa, the world's most important forage crop, is Trans-Caucasia-Iran ... Our studies show definitely that Asia is not only the home of the majority of modern cultivated plants, but also of our chief domesticated animals such as the cow, the yak, the buffalo, sheep, goat, horse, and pig...From all these definitely established facts the importance of Asia as the primary home of the greatest majority of cultivated plants and domesticated animals is quite clear." (Vavilov, N. , "Asia: Source of Species" in Asia, February 1937, p. 113. ) "In recent studies they have adjusted the dates slightly and now place domestication of sheep and goats at 11,000 years ago, pigs at 10,500, and cattle at 10,000. "The earlier dates mean that animals were domesticated at much the same time as crop plants, and bear on the issue of how this ensemble of new agricultural species – the farming package known as the Neolithic revolution – spread from the Near East to Europe."
D: Genesis chapter 5 genealogies are of patriarchal dynasties!
The six thousand year time line fails as the creation was pronounced as finished in Genesis 2:1 and the creation of all living creature DNA was finished including human DNA which has a built in limit of about 125 years! DNA of most humans has 23 pairs of chromosomes, for a total of 46. "Telomeres are end caps that protect the chromosomes from damage. Telomeres shorten as we get older causing aging in our cells. Shorter telomeres have a negative effect on our health. Telomere shortening is the main cause of age-related break down of our cells." The long times given in Genesis chapter 5 are dynasties that may overlap, like those recorded during Egypt's 18th Dynasty, and they are not the lifespan of a single individual.
Gen 5:4 And the time of Adam after he had fathered Seth was eight hundred years: and he fathered ...
Gen 5:5 And all the time that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he was deceased.
Also for verses 5:1, 5:2, 5:8, 5:11, 5:14, 5:17, 5:20, 5:23, 5:27, 5:31, 6:3, and 6:4 use time!
E: Genesis 7:11; Fountains/Springs/Wells of the Great Deep (Sea) Cleaved/Broken Up/Divided
(ESV) ... on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened. (English Standard Version 2001)
(ISV) ... all the springs of the great deep burst open, the floodgates of the heavens were opened, (International Standard Version 2011)
(NLV) ... all the underground waters erupted from the earth, and the rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky. (New Living Translation 1996)
(MSG) ... that it happened: all the underground springs erupted and all the windows of Heaven were thrown open. (The Message 2002)
(GNB) ... all the outlets of the vast body of water beneath the earth burst open, all the floodgates of the sky were opened, (Good News Bible 1976)
(GW) ... all the deep springs burst open. The sky opened, (GOD'S WORD 1995)
The first Hebrew word H1234-baqa can also be used for a much less destructive regional event such as the dividing of the Red Sea!! (Definitions from The Brown-Driver-Briggs ... Lexicon (BDB) 1906)
Exo_14:21 And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided.(H1234) (KJV+ Strong's Numbers)
The majority of translations use fountains in Genesis 7:11, however, BDB recognizes the meaning as only that of a spring which is the least used translation !! Bible paraphrases often use springs. The choice seems arbitrary!
Both Strong's Dictionary and the BDB Lexicon allow the subterranean waters translation for H8415 -teho?m deep, depths, but this meaning is countered by the text of Isaiah 51:10 where the "great deep" is defined as "the sea, the waters of the great (H7227) deep (H8415) "(KJV+) and Psalms 36:6 "the great depths of the sea" (ISV)!
Instead of the unsubstantiated idea that there was a vast underground store of water which was the source of the flood, we find in older Jewish writings that the cause of the deluge came from the sky !
"When the Holy One ... wanted to bring a flood upon the world, He took two stars from Khima and brought a flood upon the world." is a quote from the English translation (by Maurice Simon, 1948) of the Tractate Brakhot of the Babylonian Talmud.
"Rabbi Moses Ben Nachman ( Died 1270 AD), a Jew living in Spain, quoted it as God taking two stars from Khima and throwing them at the earth in order to begin the great flood." (from "Comets in Ancient Cultures")
Khima/Kimah/Kiymah is mentioned in Job 9:9, Job 38:31, and Amos 5:8. The BDB definition is H3598 Kiymah: "Pleiades, a constellation of 7 stars." No Biblical Hebrew word is translated as comet. It can be assumed that "star" means any small bright shining object in the sky, as when a comet is beyond the inner solar system the tail does not show. How do we get "two stars"? "comet Biela—discovered in 1826 and detected again in 1832—was observed to suddenly split into two distinct fragments, which continued to journey side by side along the same orbit. Eventually, both parts of Biela developed into complete comets with tails and both reappeared in 1852, but they were never seen again." (source siencedirect.com ... comet-tails)
Here is an impact simulation using comet 57P-1994 and the Biblical timeline is illustrated.
Comet C/2017 01 looks just like a smaller star of the cluster as its tail was not very evident at that time. This is how the ancient observer could see the star/comet as coming from the Pleiades. The majority of the comet fragments, ice chunks or dirt, would impact (cleave/break up) the seas, some would impact the land, and some may just pass by! Much of the water content of the comet vaporizes in the atmosphere as friction heats it up and falls as rain as the 40 day event continues! A catastrophic event for the planet, but a short lived one! When Noah released the dove for a 2nd time and it did not return (Gen 8:8-9) it had found "sufficient food to eat, and a proper place for its habitation;" (John Gill's Exposition...) and by then much of the normal plant growing processes had already been restored 92 days before the exiting of the ark. (Chronology-Bible Knowledge Comm.-Old Test.-p39) There was food enough to allow the territory around the ark landing spot to be rapidly reoccupied by all the small and large species on the ark, for all to "be fruitful, and multiply" (8:17 & 9:1), and replenish the local land as it was at the completion of the creation. A long lasting global devastation would be life ending for all that were on the ark. A rapid cleansing of evil was determined by the LORD to be necessary, and the following quick total refurbishing of the land was years before the scattering of the people over all the planet in Genesis chapter 11.
Note: When using Bible paraphrases the reader should consider their repeated lack of preciseness as they call the ark either a boat or a ship, for "the ark was built in the form not of a ship, but of a chest, with flat bottom, like a floating house, as it was not meant for sailing, but merely to float upon the water" (K&D Comm. ...)! The ark was a thatch covered barn on a floating cypress log raft with many "nests" (H7066; in KJV nest-12x, rooms-1x) and with many types of food stored on board. (see Gen 6:14 & 21)
We also have information that seems to parallel the Jewish writings from Native American traditions and scientific data !!
Of Lake Mattamuskeet: “…..kneeling at a sacrificial alter, she prayed to the Great Spirit to save the brave and her perishing people. After her invocation, a star fell to the earth, and rain soon followed. Days and days of rain quenched the fire. Great holes burned in the earth by the fire were filled, forming a great inland sea.” (Algonquin Indian legend, Touring the Backroads of North Carolina’s Upper Coast, p.268)
Of Lake Waccamaw: “The local Indians are known as the “People of the Falling Star,” and they believed the lake was created by a falling star, perhaps a great meteorite.” (Waccamaw-Siouan Indian legend, Wild Shores, Exploring the Wilderness Areas of Eastern North Carolina. p.150) ... From Chinese silks, to petroglyphs and the Holy Bible, hundreds of legends and holy scripts are easily interpreted as descriptive of comets and their sometimes awful consequences for the environment ... Scientists have long puzzled over the apparent climate shift at this time (Younger-Dryas (YD) see figure below). A relatively mild world of large mammals and abundant resources turned suddenly to a harsh clime as cold as the coldest times of the last Ice Age. The suddenness is most strikingly suggested by the frozen mammoth unearthed in Russia through the years. Some with flowering vegetative remains still in their stomachs. ... Like mammoth, large saber toothed cats, giant ground sloth and other now extinct Pleistocene mammals, giant beaver were residents of the Bay area in relatively recent times. Skeletons and remains of these enormous beasts are found all over the world, many dating to around the time of Bay formation, which generally coincides with the sudden global climatic transition from the Pleistocene to the Holocene age around 12,000 years ago. ... evidence of the event marking the dawn of the modern climatic age — and the subsequent rise of agricultural man, ..."
Shown below is modified fig. 3 from h-tp://www.tu-darmstadt.de /.../landmann/.../ gusdvs.htm
(Chronozone abbreviations: YD-Younger Dryas, AL-Allerød, BO-Bølling; DR1-Oldest Dryas.)
Conclusion: "all the springs/wells of the great depths of the seas were broken up," is best paraphrase!
F: The Exodus Population; Families instead of thousand! The size of archaeological Jericho at less than 10 acres indicates an ancient population of no more that 3,000.
An indicator that the conquering Israelites must have had a population much smaller than the approximate 2 million to 3 million which some have estimated. Secular population estimates are that Egypt at the time had a total population of about 4 million. Could the Israelites have left with around half the population of the country at that time? Could they have outnumbered the citizens of Jericho inside the walls by possibly 667 to 1 or more ? The Hebrew word most often translated as thousand, H505, is per Strong the same as H504 for which the first definition listed is "a family". Translating it as families instead of thousand the values for each tribe are decreased greatly and also the total number of Israelites in the Exodus!!
Num 1:21 those counted of the tribe of Reuben were 46 families and 500. [instead of 46,500]This change is required in chapters 1-13x, 2-17x, 3-5x, 4-4x, 11-1x and 26-14x, and also in Exo 12:37 and 38:26 !
Num 31:4 You will send a troop from each of the tribes of Israel to the war." (Def. after the next verse.)G: Joshua 10; The Sun and Moon were at Rest in Place instead of standing still! The wording of the Hebrew text does not require the sun and moon to stop/stand still in the sky! "ordinances of the sun, moon, and stars, (Jer 31:35); the original constitution and law of nature, settled from the beginning of the world, and observed ever since, in the constant revolution of day and night; and which was formed into a covenant and promise to Noah, after the deluge, that day and night should not cease, as long as the earth remained, (Gen 8:22); and which has never been, nor can be, broken and made void": (John Gill Expo. ... on Jeremiah 33:20) The statement "And there was no day like that, before it or after it" ( Jos 10:14) would be fully satisfied by a severe killer hailstorm soon followed by a clearing of all storm clouds from the sky for the entire night for which Joshua prayed. Allowing the Israelites to pass through the Aijalon Valley and complete the pursuit under a bright clear moonlight sky, without interruption, to Makkedah where the five kings were trapped in a cave for punishment.
Num 31:5 So there were committed, out of the multitudes of Israel, a troop from each tribe, twelve troops armed for war. ( H505 BDB def. "as a company of men under one leader, troops")
Num 31:6 And Moses sent them to the war, a troop from each tribe, ...
Jos 10:12 It was on the day when the Lord gave up the Amorites into the hands of the children of Israel that Joshua said to the Lord, before the eyes of Israel, Sun, be at rest (H1826) over Gibeon; and you, O moon, in the valley of Aijalon. (Bible in Basic English (BBE) 1965 amplified)
Jos 10:13 And the sun was at rest (H1826) and the moon kept its place ( H5975) till the nation had given punishment to their attackers. Is it not recorded in the book of Jashar? So the sun kept its place (H5975) in the middle of the heavens, and was waiting, and did not go down, for the space of a day.
Addenda - More on Pleiades and comets
Pleiades: "It probably derives from plein (Greek 'to sail') because of the cluster's importance in delimiting the sailing season in the Mediterranean Sea. ... The nine brightest stars are named for the Seven Sisters of Greek mythology: Sterope, Merope, Electra, Maia, Taygeta, Celaeno, and Alcyone, along with their parents Atlas and Pleione." ... It is the nearest 'Messier object' (M45) to Earth, and is the most obvious cluster to the naked eye in the night sky. ... Charles Messier compiled a catalogue of comet-like objects, published in 1771. ... With sharp eyes and a clear, dark sky, it is possible to spot from 12 to 14 stars in the Pleiades group. ... Reflection nebulae around the brightest stars were once thought to be left over material from their formation, but are now considered likely to be an unrelated dust cloud in the interstellar medium through which the stars are currently passing. ...
Why the added "as if" story? "Many different cultures have names for the Pleiades that often include the number seven, such as the 'Seven Sisters', 'Seven Maidens', or 'Seven Little Girls' . This might seem odd to modern observers, who can typically discern only six stars in the cluster."(space.com 10/08/19) "In Japan, the cluster is mentioned under the name Mutsuraboshi ("six stars") in the 8th-century Kojiki." (Wikipedia-Pleiades) The easily discernible number of stars has changed with time, apparently from 9 to 7 in ancient times, and from 7 to 6 more recently.
Amos_5:8 He who made the Pleiades and Orion, and turns deep darkness into the morning and darkens the day into night, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out on the surface of the earth, the LORD is his name; (ESV) H3598 kiymah BDB Def.: 1) Pleiades, a constellation of seven stars
Commentators John Gill and Albert Barnes agree that Amos 5:8 is concerning the time of the deluge !! Others do not !! "This can be no other than a memory of the flood ..." (Barnes) "as in the time of the universal deluge, to which some Jewish writers apply this ..." (Gill) (Possibly Gill is referring to the writers of the Talmud as he refers to the Talmud 340 times.)
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown: "the seven stars — literally, the heap or cluster of seven larger stars and others smaller (Job_9:9; Job_38:31). The former whole passage seems to have been in Amos’ mind. He names the stars well known to shepherds (to which class Amos belonged), Orion as the precursor of the tempests which are here threatened, and the Pleiades as ushering in spring. ... calleth for the waters of the sea — both to send deluges in judgment, and the ordinary rain in mercy ... ."
Bible Knowledge Com.: "The rising of Pleiades before daybreak signaled the return of spring" ...
"When the ark came to rest...It was a new beginning; the world was clean and at rest."
Adam Clarke sees the description as that of rainfall per Job 36:27-28: "Calleth for the waters of the sea - Raising them up by evaporation, and collecting them into clouds. And poureth them out - to drop down in showers upon the face of the earth. The Lord has done this. Mathew Henry Agrees!
Amos does not plainly indicate any connection between the deluge and any number of stars in the Pleiades. He does include them within the same passages concerning the might of the Creator and His "pouring out" waters on the earth and as pointed out commentators Barnes and Gill believe this is referring to the deluge.
There can be doubt that the appearance of two stars/comets coming from the area of the Pleiades is a very realistic scenario! What was initially one comet can split and become 2 comets traveling together, like modern comet Biela (1825-1852). And each can become more fragmented like 57P/du Toit-Neujmin-Delporte (1994) and even further broken up when entering earth's atmosphere !! Comets can be 50% or greater water ice which can evaporate in the atmosphere and become rain. Most fragments, large ice chunks or dirt, reaching the surface would impact the seas, breaking them up, and a smaller number would impact land ! The effect on some areas of the earth would be catastrophic, but could be rather short-lived, the size of the comet being an important factor, and recovery to normal growing conditions needs to be within less than a year per Bible chronology as the occupants leave the ark to breed abundantly, be fruitful, and multiply on the land !
