God and Change

I received two questions from a fellow Changing Earth Creationist about my last post denying the Second Law interpretation of Romans 8:19 - 22.

The first question related to the passive verb to liberate, set free, in Romans 8:21. Paul said the creation will be set free (future passive) from slavery to corruption (phthora). In order to understand passive liberation we should first consider that the creation’s present enslavement to corruption came about passively (with respect to God). Paul first used the word subjected (hupotasso - an orderly submission) in the passive voice in Romans 8:20 - the creation was passively subjected to futility. Later in the same verse, the creation actively submits (in an orderly manner) because of him who subjected it. We first need to understand that the curse itself was passive.

God warned Adam that on the day you eat the forbidden fruit, dying continue to die. (In Hebrew, the word death is repeated first as an infinitive and than as imperfect.) We often spiritualize this by claiming Adam died spiritually the day he ate the fruit. Adam became mortal on the day he disobeyed and his mortality continued until it culminated at 930 years of age. God did not kill Adam. His death was the natural outcome of his sin and subsequent mortality.

In Genesis chapter three, God cursed all the animals with a passive curse that continues in unbroken continuity. According to the Bible, the first land animals were vegetarians. We find the fossils of animals that were much larger than their present descendants and many that are now extinct. However, not all animal changes are natural, a result of a Divine passive curse. God does intervene so animals can survive in a changing world. God claims to feed carnivorous lions in Job 38:39 - 40. Many relational changes are needed for the digestive system of a vegetarian to change to a carnivore.

Again in Genesis three, God curses the ground passively, which continues in unbroken continuity. God did not have to create thorns and thistles. They sprang up by means of natural and continuing corruption of the ground. God is not actively corrupting His creation. Corruption happens, with respect to God,  passively. With respect to the creation, it actively continues to change in the direction of inutility.

Perhaps during the millennial age, God will again command nature but this time to reverse the trend. In the same manner as the natural and continuous original curse, there will be a future passive liberation of the creation from its slavery to corruption. During the millennial age, lions will again eat grass like an ox. Men will again live like a tree. The Earth will again be green and productive. Men will still be sinners, even though the devil is no longer the ruler of this world. Yet the curse will still exist and men will still die although nature will not be as harsh and mortals will live longer.

I understand the passive nature of the liberation from the corruption as showing that everything does not suddenly become perfect during the millennium age. Think of how things changed during Noah’s lifetime. Noah was 600 years old when the great cataclysm inundated all the surface of the earth. Noah lived another 350 years after the flood and outlived his great grandsons but he did not outlive his sons. For various, probably emergent reasons, each generation lived fewer years and had children at a younger age. Evidently natural degeneration (what happens passively with respect to God) resulted in Noah’s descendants eventually only living to 120 years (Genesis 6:3) and latter to only seventy years (Psalm 90). Perhaps during the millennial age, those who survived from the old world order, will not live as long as those who are born in the age of peace. Nature will change during the millennium age in the opposite direction.

The second question. Is all change evil? If not, how can we discern between natural changes and the finger of God? God is always good. James 1:17 “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.” Psalms 145:9 “The LORD is good to all, And His mercies are over all His works.” “He  causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” In my opinion, when we see changes that are relational, animals and plants interacting in a manner that preserves life, that is God’s doing. Some changes, such as germs that become more virulent or genetic changes that accumulate to worsen later generations, that is partially from the passive curse. However, both kinds of changes are ongoing and we cannot precisely separate what is from the hand of God and what is a result of natural degeneration. The curse is affecting everything in creation so that it is in bondage to degenerative change. Hebrews 1:3 Christ upholds (continues to bear, to carry) all things. He continues to sustain the creation even as it groans together and experiences the together pangs of corruption.

In summary, God passively cursed the creation because of Adam’s sin. Change in a worsening direction is part of nature, part of the curse. Today all of creation, including atoms, are affected by this orderly continuing degeneration. God is still good to His creation. He continues to preserve the Earth for the maintenance of life even as everything is corrupting.

In the new-in-form world (the reconstituted earth into which the New Jerusalem will descend) all corruption will cease and some atoms will allow light to pass through them (translucent gold). Things will still change but all change will be good.  There will be no Sun or Moon, yet the tree of life will produce twelve kinds of fruit, one kind each month. Evidently the eons will continue and the saved will experience the unending eons. There will be no death, no sickness and no more curse.


The picture of deformed hands is from user Drahreg01 on wikipedia.org  and is released under the GNU Free Documentation License.

The Bible and the Second Law

According to the Apostle Paul, the creation will at some future point be passively liberated from its slavery to change (phthora - Romans 8:21). What did he mean by phthora? Plato used the phrase "genesis ka phthora" for the process that corrupts everything since the beginning. Aristotle used the word phthora for a city that changed to another constitution: fundamental change. In this text the phthora change is in the direction of ruin. Origen, in his commentary on Romans, understood Paul to refer to qualitative changes in all things, including the Sun and stars.


Paul began this section by stating that we know (eidon): to perceive with the eyes, to notice, to look at. Others saw these things since Paul said we know. In Paul’s days, even the pagan philosophers acknowledged that everything changes. The only thing that Plato could imagine that is not changing is an undetectable parallel universe, the form of things. Aristotle acknowledged that everything corrupts but he imagined that hypokeimenon (what is under) suffers no change. Claudius Ptolemy wrote that all things without exception are changing. He thought that mathematics was reliable because when things change, mathematics tracks with the changing things. He claimed that physics was like guesswork because the nature of things is unstable. Evidently no one in the biblical age could imagine that matter is unchanging.

Paul used the word gar in verse Romans 8:19, 20 & 21. It is a particle that can mean truly, especially the causal reason for something. He used the compound verb hupotasso twice. Hupo means under and tasso to appoint, arrange, to order. Polybius used hupotasso for troops arranged in order under the commands of their general. The first hupotasso verb is aorist passive. The creation did not originate its orderly corruption. The curse of the animals and the ground in Genesis is also passive. God did not create thorns and thistles, they came about by means of the passive curse. The second hupotasso verb is an aorist active participle. The creation actively and in an orderly manner carries out the command to become futile, to inutility and transitoriness.

In verse 21 Paul explained that at some future point the creation will be liberated from its slavery to phthora. Then in verse 22 he explained that the whole creation groans together [sustenazo] and pains together [sunodino]. Groaning together was the common experience of the citizens of a city that fell to the Roman army. Everyone in the city experienced the horror of the army’s payday at their expense, so they groaned together. Sunodino means to travail together and was used for the together pains of childbirth when many muscles contract together and in sequence.

Let’s review Paul’s statements.
1. We know by seeing that the creation is corrupting itself.
2. The changes began at an unspecified point (the curse?) and are continuous until now.
3. The changes in creation are orderly - in obedience to God's command.4. The things that are changing are not just local, since they extend to the whole creation.
5. The changes in creation are not for the better, since they are in the direction of inutility.
6. The changes in creation are together changes. Things that change together in an orderly manner, change relationally. Relational change is where nothing is independent or unchanging, but all things change together, in parallel.

Now let’s examine the Second Law interpretation to see if it fits the text.
1. No one during Paul’s days saw or knew anything about the Second Law.
2. The Second Law is not an orderly process. It expects orderly things to become disorderly by random processes.
3. The second law is not applied to the whole creation. The internal processes in all atoms are excluded from the Second Law. Scientists assume that atoms are perpetual motion engines since they define their measuring units using atomic clocks that allegedly are always clocking the same frequencies. Most  scientific definitions, measuring units, methods and mathematical formulas presume that atoms remain the same, since scientific empiricism depends on that assumption.
4. The second Law is not about relational changes, things that change in parallel.

What if Paul had a vision of the future predicting the Second Law and intended that interpretation. He should have written, someday people will know through mathematical reasoning that the things created after the first day, groan and suffer the pains of childbirth together until now.

The double emphasis on orderly change and togetherness suggest that Origen was closer to Paul's intended meaning than creation scientists. Today we can see with telescopes in billions of galaxies that all atoms are changing relationally and have been doing so for vast ages. The earliest atomic clocks we have analyzed to date clocked less than 1/10th the frequencies of modern atoms. The changes in the light from all atoms must have been orderly since modern atoms still function in an orderly manner.

Paul never suggests that we fight with science. He says the weapons of our warfare are divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ  and we are ready to punish all disobedience, whenever your obedience is complete. (2 Corinthians 10:3 - 6). Changing Earth Creationists believe that someday, when our obedience is complete, we will use the word of God to bring down science itself. What glory the Creator will get when he makes foolish the wisdom of this age, as He promised. Look at galactic history and you will see the simple answer to the age of the universe puzzle. The stars continued to come out and spread out as galaxies grew into huge local growth spirals as every atom has changed in an orderly manner. The inertial orbits, the atomic clocks and the space matter takes up all changed relationally,  together. The only history that is visible as it happened is galactic history and what is visible exactly fits the literal, biblical text both for creation and cosmic history.

This is galaxy number HUDF 4491 from NASA's Hubble Ultra Deep Field. Notice the distinct separate globs (evidently of close together stars) emerging from the redder core. Evidently this is a spiral arm just beginning to form and emerge. The light from this ancient galaxy shines at less than 50% of the frequencies of modern atoms.

Venus Resonance and Biblical History

Radar observations of Venus’ surface at conjunction show that it points the same surface longitude toward us as it passes. Venus is due to pass Earth and cross the face of the Sun on June 5 in the western USA and June 6 on the other side of the international date line. Each passage is not identical since both Venus and Earth have elliptical orbits. However, every eight years (every fifth conjunction) the orbital parameters are almost identical. If one arranges the conjunctions into five groups each separated by eight years, we find that the surface longitudes at passage do not drift off. The sub conjunction longitudes oscillate plus or minus a few degrees but shows a remarkable rotational resonance with Earth’s orbit.

To view a java applet showing Venus’s rotational resonance click here:
http://godsriddle.com/cosmos/Venus.html
Click the slow or stop buttons to examine the resonance in slow motion

Radar also reveals that Venus has a retrograde rotation. Venus' sidereal rotation (its spin referenced to the distant stars) is 243.0187 earth days. Venus’ sidereal year is 224.7 earth days. The rotation referenced to the stars is longer than the year. The day night cycle (not the same as the sidereal day) is 116.8 earth days because of this slow backwards rotation. The Sun rises in the west and sets in the east every 58.4 earth days.

Venus’ synodic cycle is 583.9 earth days. Five synodic phenomena of Venus equals 2920 days that is within a day of eight years on earth. Every 584 days, the Earth has rotated one orbit plus 215 degrees while Venus has been catching us by completing two orbits plus 215 degrees. Venus spin axis is upside down, pointing to the ecliptic’s south pole instead of the north like most of the planets. Precession is the process of incrementally applying a torque to a rotating body which acts 90 degrees in the direction of rotation and re-orients the spin axis. The tidal effects of a close encounter could have precessed Venus almost 180 degrees.

Did Venus pass close to Earth in the past? The Babylonians recorded which way Venus’s horns pointed when it passed, as though they saw it as we see the moon. The Bible also mentions a close encounter when the stars (kokabiym) fought from their courses. If a hot star closely passed on its course, it would burn us up - not cause heavy rain. The ancients mentioned that Venus had a coma, long hair, a vapor tail. In Hebrew, kokab is Mercury and kokab nogah is Venus. Did these planets pass close to Earth, causing heavy rain and the other catastrophes the ancients mentioned?

The earliest astronomical record during the 21 year reign of king Ammizaduga shows that Venus had a different orbit. It took approximately the same number of days for its synodic cycle. However it spent weeks too long on the far side of the Sun and half the difference too short for both evening and morning phases. It sometimes rushed past earth in one day. Today it takes about eight days between the evening and morning phases. These could only be valid if the whole solar system was smaller a few thousand years ago.
 
It is important to begin your analysis of earth history by examining your assumptions. Scientists always begin every analysis with their prime assumption, which they never question. They believe that atoms do not change themselves as they age because their empiricism depends on that assumption. They use the presumption that the properties of matter are fixed to contrive thousands of operational definitions, mathematical measuring schemes and constants. Scientists are not so interested in what the ancients, including the biblical authors, recorded. They try to decode reality with their symbolical constants. Yet we can see with sight in galactic history how every atom clocked a different frequency long ago. It is not just the atomic clocks that have accelerated, but the orbits have also accelerated as billions of galaxies grew into huge, local,  growth spirals without any evidence of accretion or growth by collisions. Evidently orbits spiral out because the properties of all matter visibly continue to change throughout cosmic history.

Indeed, the Bible says the Earth spreads out in unbroken continuity, which happens above the waters. We find that the continents only fit together on a tiny globe; that the seas are young with the youngest seafloor lying adjacent to a global, volcanic expansion seam; and that the theory of subduction is denied by the layered undisturbed sediments in the “subduction trenches.”

Look at galactic history and observe that what is visible exactly fits the record of creation. Elohim continued to form the Sun, Moon and stars and continued to place them in the spreading place (raqiya) half way through the creation week. We observe how the space matter takes up, its inertial properties and its atomic frequencies continue to change as billions of galaxies at many ranges intrinsically grew, the stars streams continuing to come out. If the same laws are applicable here in the solar system as we observe in cosmic history, then planet orbits must have been close together back when matter clocked less than 1/11th the frequencies of modern atoms.

The picture is from NASA and shows the transit of Venus eight years ago.