How old Earth the James Webb Space Telescope saw
How old is the Earth, and what did the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) see? In the beginning, the Eternal One created the heavens and the earth. Before the beginning, there was nothing but Him. The Torah tells us nothing about the age of the universe, focusing almost entirely on the creation of the Earth and on the way the lives of the people who inhabit to be conducted. The Torah may not say how old the Earth is, but it says instead that the Creator made the universe and everything in it visible and invisible in six days. Science, however, claims that the Earth is billions of years old. While science appears convincing that the Earth is incredibly old, ironically, there is a scientific method that testifies to the opposite, namely, that life on our planet is in fact incredibly young. This method is called “Radiocarbon-14 dating”.
Despite what science claims, in the following, we would like to posit another way to look at this controversial “old earth vs young earth” debate specifically in reference to the age of the universe, as we will rewind time to the very beginning.
“If you read the Bible for curiosity, you will see nothing. If you read it for knowledge, you will get some knowledge. But if you read the Bible for faith, you will get more faith, more knowledge, and even some curious facts”. Navah
What is the James Webb Space Telescope seeing?
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) images already started challenging the standard theories of the origin of the universe. Credit: NASA.
When science says that the first galaxies were seen 500-800 million years after the “Big Bang”, this is exactly what it means: they were seen, i.e., they appeared that old. It would be misleading to say that the first galaxies were formed then, as if someone was there to witness it. But as the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is sending more and more images, it seems that NASA does not want to see what its baby saw.
Even NASA’s scientists are forced by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) images to admit that the “Big Bang” cannot be seen. Michio Kaku, renounced theoretical physicist, broke the silence surrounding the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) images. He said that scientists need to reverse their understanding of the origin of the universe. (Michio Kaku: Big Bang DEBUNKED! James Webb Detected 750 Galaxies Outside The Universe! – video) What does it mean?
According to the “Big Bang” theory, the first galaxies formed after the “Big Bang” should have been small, while they were growing bigger and bigger over the billions of years. But this is not what the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) saw. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) saw no less than six big galaxies in the begging of the universe. And how many more big galaxies are out there which the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) may see, as it is exploring the universe, we do not know. Not yet. Leaving the science behind and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) up there, we will turn to the Bible for the answers we are looking for.
In the words of the Torah
The old saying, “The language of the Torah is like the language of man”, takes precedent when such a matter as science in the Bible is discussed. What this saying means is that the Scripture speaks the language of man in order to make him understand, not to confuse. And indeed, we can imagine how perplexed Mosheh would have been writing down Genesis, if the narrator had used the scientific language we use today.
The great sages have understood the Creator’s reckoning of time allotted to man to be 6,000 years. In the words of the Talmud:
For six thousand years the world will exist: there will be two thousand years of Tohu [“void”], two thousand years of Torah, and two thousand years of the Messiah. But because of our sins, which are many, several of these [Messianic years] have already passed…. the Holy One, blessed be He, will renew His world only after seven thousand years. [Sanhedrin 97a-b]
In other words, the world was created to exist for six thousand years, and then the seventh millennium. The seventh millennium is thus a Sabbath to Him. A good departure point to finding the age of the universe in our discussion is to read from the Psalms. It is for this reason that Mosheh wrote,
For a thousand years in Your eyes are like yesterday that has past, or like a watch in the night. (Psa 90:4)
As in Deuteronomy so is it in Psalm, Mosheh’s use of words is never incidental. This verse seems straightforward, but there are layers of meaning behind it. A closer examination of the text shows that Mosheh is not merely being poetical here, but that he might have referred to a deeper level of understanding, whose symbolic meaning of the verse is clear and not difficult to perceive. In order to make this clear to the reader, the apostle goes on to say,
But, beloved ones, let not this be hidden from you: that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. (2Pe 3:8)
What exactly is being described here? Understand this according to what it literally implies. This is stated simply to be understood simply. When the Creation week is considered, this verse translates into the following: with the Lord one day is as a thousand years (i.e., 6 days = 6,000 years), and a thousand years as one day (6,000 year = 6 days).
A thousand years, which would make the first human Adam (who lived 930 years) incredibly old, are to the Creator like nonexistence by comparison. The opposite statement of the apostle that one day is like a thousand years with the Everlasting is not to be understood as if He exists in space and time. But this verse is to be understood from the standpoint of man taken in retrospect. Regardless how minuscule a millennium appears to Him, and a day is merely nothing in His sight, man sees the creation as something beyond him. Hence, a whole millennium appears to the Creator just as a day does to man who looks back upon it when it has already passed by. According to the simple interpretation of the verse, the phrase “a thousand years are as a day for the Creator” means that a thousand years are like an instant in His eyes.
With the above in mind, we now return to our original question: How old is the Earth? We, however, will leave the question open for now and will pose another one: How old was the first man Adam when he was created on the sixth day of Creation? According to the account in Genesis, he was one day old on the first Sabbath, when the Creator made him. But let us suspend this question for a moment and raise one more question: How old did Adam look when the Creator made him? We will explain below the purpose of these questions.
The Torah had not spelled out the creation of the angels; the narrator had deliberately refrained from having written down anything about either the domains of heaven or the creation of the angels. The first man was created on the sixth day, and on the seventh day, the first Sabbath, he was one day old. By the blessing in Genesis 1:28, the Creator not only granted upon man the power to multiply and fill the earth but also the dominion to rule over the earth and every beast. From the Creation account we thus see that Adam was mature enough to know the Creator and to make his choice when he sinned in the Garden of Eden. Adam was one day old, but how old did he look like? Let us assume that he might have looked like 20, 30, or even 40 years old. In fact, we are not told how old he looked like and probably that did not matter to Mosheh either. Yet, the present author’s understanding is that Adam must have been at least 20 years old in maturity. This age limit of maturity would be established at Sinai 2454 years later.
On the supposition, which is a very probable one, that Adam was one day old but looked like a young man, we may draw conclusion that the same line of thought may be applied to the age of Earth, namely, it was young but looked very old. With the above in mind, we will ask the most logical question: How old did the Earth look when the Creator made it on the third day? This is a difficult question to answer decisively. Perhaps, one day the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will throw light on this, but we are now more interested in our supposition. We must therefore view the above reasoning as telling us that the explanation of Adam’s age may serve as an illustration of Earth’s age. Whether the Earth looked like a thousand or million years old, we are not told, and it does not matter. The Earth was created about 6,000 years ago but looks very old to us.
One final thought. If the universe is expending, according to the “Big Bang” theory, then we should expect to see less and less galaxies as we go closer and closer to the end of the universe, until we find none. But the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) images prove just the opposite: the universe is uniformly filled with galaxies showing a single form of intricate design in all occurrences.
Having now completed our exposition, let the reader not hope that we have explained everything about our planet’s age, for that is absolutely impossible, but that we have tried to provide a new approach to the matter of “old earth vs young earth”. And if we are right in our supposition that the earth is young, the reader may be interested in knowing what time it is now on the Creator’s clock.
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May we merit seeing the coming of our Mashiach speedily in our days!
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