This appendix is divided into two parts. Part One examines "Biblical" arguments used to try and claim that the days of Genesis chapter 1 are not literal, ordinary days. We believe that most of these have arisen from the attempt to harmonize the Bible with evolution. Part Two gives very brief answers to common questions relating to evolution and the Bible.

Argument 1: The days of Genesis chapter 1 are not literal, ordinary days because 2 Peter 3:8 says, "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years".

Answer: Second Peter 3:8 is stating God’s transcendence above time in the context of the certainty of the Christ’s return. It has no contextual connection with Genesis 1. It says "But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." If someone insists on using this text to confirm that one day equals a thousand years then they must also let others use it to say that a thousand years equals one day! They must also concede that Psalm 90:4 can be used to claim that a thousand years equals four hours (a watch in the night). 2 Peter 3:8 is comparing a "day" with a thousand years. It does not define what a "day" is. Peter realizes, of course, that his audience already knows what a day is.

The Fourth Commandment says "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work". The reason given is "For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day". If we insist on using 2 Peter 3:8 to claim that Genesis 1 is about six thousand years, then we must also say that the Fourth Commandment tells us to work six thousand years before resting for another thousand.

Argument 2: The days of Genesis 1 cannot be literal 24 hour days because there was no sun until day four of Creation Week.

Answer: We do not need the sun to have a 24-hour period with evening and morning. What we need is an appropriate light source and a rotating Earth. A light source was provided on day one and may have been God Himself (c.f. Revelation 22:5). The idea of having the sun to initiate and sustain life is critical for the theory of evolution, as indeed it is for many pagan sun-god religions. But Genesis chapter 1 sweeps all these things away declaring that God is the One who initiates and sustains.

Argument 3: The days of Genesis 1 can be interpreted as long eons because the phrase "evening and morning" is not used in association with the seventh day in Genesis 2:1-3.

Answer: We know for a certainty that the seventh day is a 24-hour period by reading the Fourth Commandment. In Genesis 2:1-3 the term "day" is qualified by the number seven. It is thus clearly linked to the preceding six days of creation and demonstrated to be, like the previous days, a 24-hour period.

Argument 4: Genesis chapter 2 presents a different history of creation than chapter 1. How then can we say that the days of chapter 1 are definitely literal days?

Answer: Genesis chapter 2 is a more complete description of day six of creation, whereas chapter 1 is an introduction and overview of the whole of Creation Week. Genesis 2:19 says, "And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them." This verse should not be used to teach that Adam was created before the land animals. Genesis chapter 1 has already made clear the order of creation. Genesis 2:19 is in the context of a companion being found for Adam. It was "not good" for Adam to be alone, and in unfolding His remedy God first brought some previously created animals to Adam. Perhaps God wanted Adam to realize more fully his need for a true companion. Adam would surely have thought, God has made these animals for me and they are in pairs. They do not satisfy my desire for a companion. I wonder if God has a real friend to bring to me? By thinking things through Adam was made more sensible of his need and therefore was in a position to better appreciate and cherish the woman who was eventually provided. The idea in Genesis 2:18-23 is that Adam had a problem. Animals were supplied, but did not help. Then Eve was provided and the issue was solved.

Argument 5: Genesis 1 cannot be about literal days, as Adam could never have named all the animals in one day.

Answer: By comparing Genesis 2:18-23 with 1:26-31 we can see that Adam’s naming of animals and birds occurred on the sixth day of creation and before Eve was made. Genesis 2:19a says: "And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them..." The translators have supplied the word "them". So, logically, this verse means that God created every bird and fowl but just brought some to Adam. It says "He brought unto Adam", not "He brought them all to Adam". Genesis 2:19b, 20 would then mean that Adam gave names to all of the animals and birds that were specifically brought to him at that time, but did not find anything to satisfy his need for a companion. Genesis 2:19-20 specifically omits the "creeping things" that were created on the sixth day (Genesis 1:24-26). Thus Adam did not name things like insects on the sixth day. Studying and naming insects would not have helped Adam sense his need for a companion. God probably only brought a selection of animals and birds to achieve His desired purpose. The rest of the naming would be a pleasant job for Adam and Eve to do together. We must remember too that Adam had a perfect brain and would be able to do appropriate naming much faster than anyone today.

Argument 6: The word "day" in Genesis 1 cannot mean an ordinary day because Genesis 2:4 uses the word differently saying "In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens."

Answer: The Hebrew word for "day" is yome and, like our English word, it can have several different meanings. For example in Genesis 7:12 it means the light part of the day as opposed to the dark part. In other places it clearly refers to a 24-hour period consisting of light and dark. This is the case with the six days of creation in Genesis chapter 1. Elsewhere the term is used to mean a certain time in a more general sense. For example "the day of the LORD" (Isaiah 13:6 etc.). In Genesis 2:4 "day" is used in this general sense. The term is not qualified by a number or by "evening and morning". It simply means "at the time that the Lord God made the Earth and the heavens".

The following is a list of some of the commoner questions that come up, along with a very brief answer. For additional information readers are referred to The Revised and Expanded Answers Book, Batton D Ed., www.AnswersinGenesis.com.

Question 1: If the Bible is true, who was Cain’s wife?

Answer: Adam and Eve had daughters as well as sons (Genesis 5:4). Because of the lack of genetic imperfections back then there was no problem with marrying a sibling. Abraham married his half-sister (Genesis 20:12) and God blessed this union. It was only later in human history that laws prohibiting the marriage of close relatives were necessary.

Question 2: Where did dinosaur fossils come from?

Answer: Dinosaurs were created along with the other animals. All except those on the ark perished in Noah’s flood. Fossils are evidence of Noah’s flood. They result from an organism being rapidly buried under water. A dead animal lying on the seabed would not turn into a fossil because scavengers would rapidly consume it. The Bible describes animals that sound like dinosaurs living after the flood (Job 40:15-24; 41:1-34). There is evidence that the now extinct "dragons" of the middle ages and earlier were what we today call dinosaurs (the word "dinosaur" was invented in 1841).

Question 3: How did all the animals fit on the ark?

Answer: The number of known species of mammals, birds and reptiles (fish, amphibians and most insects did not need to be on the ark) alive today varies depending on who is consulted. A reasonable figure would be 40, 000. But what we call a species today was almost certainly not applicable in Noah’s time. We believe that the "kinds" (Genesis 6:20) of animals back then were more genetically rich and less specialized than today’s species, corresponding more to modern genera. This means that for every dozen species today there may have been only one "kind" in Noah’s day. For example, a single "canine-kind" may have since adapted into the dog, wolf, hyena and so on. Adaptation is different from evolution. Evolution claims that chemicals developed into humans. But adaptation is the process whereby a genetically rich animal declines into one or more specialized forms.

A detailed analysis regarding the fitting animals on the ark has been done by Woodmorappe (Noah’s Ark: A Feasibility Study, Inst. for Creation Research, 1997). He found about 8,000 genera that needed to be on the vessel, including extinct genera. This means that about 16,000 individual animals had to be on board. Whitcomb and Morris in The Genesis Flood (Presbyterian & Reformed Pub. 1961) have shown that the ark’s capacity was equivalent to about 522 standard railroad stock cars, each of which can hold 240 sheep. This means 125,280 sheep could have fitted on the ark. The average size of land-dwelling species today is undoubtedly less than that of a sheep. Large animals need not have been full-grown adults. Thus, we can see that there was plenty of room.

Question 4: What about radioactive dating?

Answer: Carbon dating relates to thousands of years, not millions. Uranium-lead and other radioactive methods have huge assumptions. Such assumptions include no immersion in water, no daughter isotope being in the rock initially and the rate of decay being constant. There are many indications that the Earth is quite young. For example, if salt and mud have been washing into the oceans for billions of years why is there not much more salt in the seawater and mud on the seabed? Also the Earth’s magnetic field has been decreasing and, at the present rate, the Earth could not be more than 10, 000 years old.

Question 5: Why do we have so few human fossils?

Answer: Because few humans were buried quickly under sediment. They would have climbed high and used boats. Instead of being fossilized their bodies would have rotted. In contrast, the creatures living on the seabed would have been buried earliest and deepest.

Question 6: How does the ice age fit in with the flood?

Answer: We believe that a single ice age (with advances and retreats) followed the flood due to volcanic activity warming the oceans and producing dust that cooled the continents through reducing sun exposure.

Question 7: What about the so-called "gap theory"?

Answer: This theory places an indefinite gap of time, usually millions of years, between the first two verses of Genesis chapter 1. Generally it is claimed that the fossils were formed during this period. Really the whole idea is a pure conjecture. As mentioned earlier any theory that places long ages of death and suffering before Adam does away with the rest of the Christian faith.