DINOSAURS!
When Did They Live? Where Did They Go?
Don't Allow Your Children to be
Brainwashed with Dinosaur Mythology!
During the last few decades we have witnessed a
huge interest in so-called 'Pre-historic monsters' - indeed a
whole mythology has grown up with regard to now extinct giant
reptiles; but do we really know how much of this is pure
fiction?
There was the blockbusting Movie, Jurassic Park, and, more
recently, BBC Television even developed a whole series called
Walking With Dinosaurs in which numerous statements were
made about these beasts, often in a most categorical fashion, and
the series was plainly upheld as a science series, yet huge areas
of the programmes were actually viewed with amusement by many
scientists!
In our schools our children are taught that dinosaurs (and other
prehistoric reptiles) roamed this earth around 65 million years
ago but eventually became extinct for some reason which we cannot
be entirely certain of. The picture is presented of huge
creatures roaming this earth, mercilessly pouncing on anything
unfortunate enough to get in their way! And the whole thing is
very attractive and fascinating to our young people.
The truth, however, is far less exciting; apparently your average
'prehistoric' was about the size of a sheep, if you came across
one the size of a cow, that would be a big one! But - I can hear
you asking - what about these huge creatures which have been
reconstructed in some of our museums? Oh, there were certainly
some really big ones (depending on the type), and some of their
fossilized bones have indeed been assembled, but these huge
creatures were exceptional, elderly and slow on their feet, as
writers like Ken Ham have explained! So these elderly monsters
did not last the pace too well.
Unlike us Homosapiens who cease to grow at around 18-20 years of
age, reptiles can just go on growing where a plentiful supply of
food is at hand! So a few really old ones were, well, monsters
but perhaps a little ponderous on their feet (unlike the
portrayal usually given). Moreover an increasing number of
scientists with an interest in this area, are reminding us that
the presence of huge teeth in some fossilized giants does not
have to mean that they were carnivores, many could have been
herbivores. Bears, after all, have huge teeth but are mostly not
too interested in flesh.
But great size does not necessarily have to mean great
aggression; witness elephants, rhinos and whales which are
relatively placid in nature, yet what is more deadly than a
venomous snake? So, let us admit that a lot of what we hear about
prehistoric reptiles is, very likely, sheer mythology!
Now it probably would not matter too much if the dinosaur
mythology went no further than some of the foregoing points, but
now we must look again at a point I made in passing a little
earlier:
Our young people are taught that these creatures became extinct
around 65 million years ago! We now need to recognise that a huge
amount of guessing work is involved in arriving at such figures.
Why? Because the prevailing paradigm of evolution requires it!
The scientific establishment has chosen evolution as their
worldview, but we have to understand that if evolution ever
really occurred, it could only have occurred over almost
unimaginable ages of time. Indeed, I just stated that most
believe that the so-called prehistoric reptiles went extinct
about 65 million years ago - which is in itself a mind-boggling
period of time - but many of these same experts insist that the
creatures evolved about 235 million years ago!
"Evolutionists claim that dinosaurs evolved from some reptile
that had originally evolved from amphibians. But they cannot
point to any clear transitional (in-between) forms to
substantiate their argument. Dinosaur family trees in
evolutionary books show many distinct types of dinosaurs, but
only hypothetical lines join them up to some common ancestor. The
lines are dotted because there is no fossil evidence.
Evolutionists simply cannot prove their belief in a non-dinosaur
ancestor for dinosaurs"
('What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs', Ken Ham, p7,
2001)
Evolutionsts have a picture firmly fixed in their minds and they
refuse to be led astray by other points of view, or, indeed
facts! This picture includes the teaching that dinosaurs (I use
the term 'dinosaur' from now on to include all of these
creatures) have now long gone, but that we see their descendants
among the bird family! Of course, this is a view hotly contested
by many scientists but the public are often kept in the dark
about this; while the world of evolutionary thought is filled
with conflicts, arguments and disagreemennts, the public are
encouraged to think that there is complete harmony of
thought!
Bearing in mind that the giant dinosaurs were undoubtedly
exceptional and untypical (though their huge fossils have been
easier to find!) we should not be too surprised to discover that
some question whether all dinosaurs are really extinct.
One would have to have a huge knowledge of dinosaur bodies,
types, and body parts to be able to categorically say that
every type is now extinct. To quote just one example, as
Ken Ham says,
"Experts have been embarassed when, after having declared
animals extinct, they were discovered alive and well. For
example, explorers recently found elephants in Nepal that have
many features of mammoths."
('What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs?', page 32).
There are other examples of very odd creatures being discovered
which may be related to dinosaurs, some are to be found in dense
jungles of places like the Congo. (See 'Dinosaur Hunt' Science
Digest, 1981, 89(5);21, for instance).
But why did dinosaurs ever become mostly extinct? We have to
realise that many animals and plants have become extinct for a
variety of reasons, moreover it continues to occur!
But we currently have the sad situation that many youngsters who
are in Sunday School every week without fail, are in their school
classrooms subjected to evolutionary teaching which denies what
they are learning in Sunday School - moreover too many Christian
parents are simply allowing it to happen, without offering a more
biblical teaching about dinosaurs!!
So what can we say about dinosaurs from a biblical
perspective?
As mostly land animals, they were created on Day Six of Creation
Week, just a few thousand years ago (not the countless millions
of years that evolutionary theory requires!) See Genesis 1:
20-25,31. Of course Adam and Eve were also created on this day.
Without any question, dinosaurs lived at the same time as people!
After the Flood (and by the way, Noah would not have needed to
take giant dinosaurs on the Ark, young adults would have been
better in the case of the larger types - don't forget: the huge
ones were almost certainly elderly. Perhaps no more than 30 kinds
would have been needed on the Ark, though we cannot be sure). ,
but after the Great Flood, the dinosaurs, in common with all the
creatures, again spread out but perhaps it would now be harder
for them to survive and some of them could have started to die
out at that time.
But, one might ask, if dinosaurs can be dated as recently as the
last few thousand years, why don't we read about such monsters in
the Bible and other ancient histories and traditions?? BUT
WE DO!
For instance, it is little short of astonishing how many
civilisations and cultures carry the tradition of ancient
Dragons, which appear to have been large and dangerous
lizard-like creatures, which could - so some traditions claim -
breathe fire! We not only have the story of St George who killed
a dragon, but other stories have survived too. Of course, some of
this may be quite fanciful, yet the fact that the tradition is so
widespread is intriguing! There is usually some sort of a
basis for ancient traditions which are that widespread among many
peoples and tribes (The Worlwide Flood tradition is another
example).
Actually, the Hebrew word for 'dragon' ('tan' with its
variations) can be found 30 times within the Old Testament! In
the interests of space, I don't propose to go through all of
these here but Strong's Concordance would be of help to go
through those texts in detail. By the way, as Ken Ham points
out,
"...Strong's Concordance lists 'dinosaur' as one of the
meanings of tannin/m"
(Ken Ham, page 12).
Let it suffice for me to point out that Job 41 describes a great
sea animal which could apparently breathe fire, the Leviathan.
The 'fiery flying serpent' of Isaiah 30:6 sounds very much like
one of the flying dinosaurs such as the Pterodactyls. Then
there is the 'behemoth'. We cannot be sure just what this was,
but those Bible commentaries which have decided on something like
an elephant, are probably way off course. But the description is
not unlike a Brachiosaurus.
If we leave the Bible, the ancient legends of huge dragon-like
creatures are abundant, as we have already noted. China is
especially known for some of these stories, then there is the
story of a certain Gilgamesh who encountered a huge dragon and
killed it by cutting its head off.
So we begin to see that there actually exists quite a bit of
evidence that these creatures are not millions of years old at
all!
Why are fossils formed at all? One might expect a dead animal to
decompose fairly quickly; why are some preserved as
fossils?
For fossils to form an animal has to be buried rather quickly! It
is also increasingly being realised that only certain conditions
will do the job. Scientists have mostly now abandoned their
earlier hypotheses that these animals died gradually and became
covered in sediment, since it just does not fit what we see
happening today. So they are starting to talk about the need for
catastrophe to produce just the right conditions (See D.
Ager, 'The New Catastrophism', Cambridge University Press, 1993).
The Bible itself tells us about one such catastrophe - and the
most major one of them - the Worldwide Flood, but this
just does not fit in with evolutionary thought, so it is rejected
as a possible major cause. Of course, even if evolutionists
believed that there was a huge flood at the time that the Old
Testament indicates, they would be bound to reject this as
providing the most ideal conditions for a huge fossil layer
containing dinosaurs, since evolutionary thought must insist that
dinosaurs are millions of years old, not thousands of years
old!
Let those of us who are Christians be unafraid to teach our
children biblical truth, that truth which we are told is,
"...the beginning of wisdom" (Prov 9:10).
Let us regain our confidence in a biblical revelation which does
indeed teach us about great animals which once roamed this earth;
there is no reason to abandon biblical principles when our
children show an interest in dinosaurs, just because
scientism's explanation has become so pervasive. On the
contrary, realising that some of the great animals mentioned in
the Old Testament and in various ancient records and traditions
were almost certainly part of the dinosaur family, should renew
our enthusiasm for a Bible-based approach!
Museltof
2002
UK APOLOGETICS
WITNESS TO
THE WORD
MUSELTOF COUNTERCULT AND APOLOGETICS
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