What about other cultures that have different creation and flood accounts?
Question:
Hey Jeffrey,
I have a question: I just started a daily Bible reading program and went back over the history of mankind, creation, and the generations. I am wondering: Are these the only people who were living on the Earth at this time? How would you compare Genesis with other ancient civilizations' generations or old recorded history? I realize Genesis is inspired by God and infallible, but how would one handle the different flood accounts from different cultures and some of their ancient history? Also, different civilizations talk about Nephilim (they don't use that name, but have ridiculous origin stories of how these giants came about.) I guess my question is: Are they wrong and is Genesis the only true account?
Answer:
If you and several of your friends witnessed an accident and I asked you to write down an account of what happened, all the accounts would have different details. People being people, several of the accounts will have incorrect details. Now if I ask you to write an account of the accident five years later, the differences would be greater and the number of errors will increase because people's memories are not perfect.
The Bible records the account of the beginning and the flood that, while written by men, is inspired by the Holy Spirit. "But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God" (II Peter 1:20-21). But other cultures did not have God preserving their memories and correcting inaccurate facts. Thus, that there are differences is expected. What becomes interesting is the number of overlaps with the biblical account. It shows that there is a core set of memories that appears among the various cultures.
All people descend from Adam and Eve. Eve's name means "mother of all living." Paul stated: "And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings" (Acts 17:28). There are no true races of men, only different nationalities.
Keep in mind that datings of various cultures are being done by people with a strong desire to come up with old dates in order to justify evolution. For instance, the standard dating of the Egyptian culture shows it dating back further than the Bible indicates the world has been in existence. However, if you look closely, you will notice that there is a basic assumption that no king's rule overlapped with other kings, even though Egypt is a significantly sized area. Removing overlaps creates the appearance of a long period of time. But if overlaps did occur, which is the more logical option, then Egyptian history easily fits in the time since the flood. The same argument can be made for Chinese culture.
Response:
Oh, yes sir, that makes perfect sense! Especially the part about the Egyptian kings' rule. I had to read over it a couple of times to grasp it, but it makes perfect sense. Egypt is huge, so kings' reigns probably overlapped, and like you said those people didn't have God preserving their memories like the Scriptures do.
And I believe that they would try to make the dates seem long ago to support their theory of evolution. It seems as if everything has to fit in that timeline in regards to secular education even if it is point blank wrong. Evolutionists don't want to admit they're wrong and have to rewrite all the textbooks.
