Young Earth creationism (YEC) is a form of creationism. Its central belief is that the Earth and the biosphere were created by various supernatural acts of the Abrahamic God between about 10,000 and 6,000 years ago, directly contradicting established scientific data that puts the age of Earth around 4.54 billion years. Events such as Noah's Flood are described as explaining much of the geological and fossil record. YEC is best described as a religious belief in the inerrancy of certain literal interpretations of the Book of Genesis. The largest young Earth creationist organizations are Answers in Genesis, Institute for Creation Research, and Creation Ministries International.
This is in contrast with old Earth creationism (OEC), which holds that literal interpretations of Genesis are compatible with the scientifically determined ages of the Earth and the universe, and theistic evolution, which posits that scientific principles of evolution, the Big Bang, abiogenesis, solar nebular theory, age of the universe, and age of Earth are compatible with a metaphorical interpretation of the Genesis creation account.
Since the mid-20th century, young Earth creationists—starting with Henry Morris (1918–2006)—developed and promoted a pseudoscientific explanation called creation science as a basis for religious belief in a supernatural, geologically recent creation, in response to scientific acceptance of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, which was developed over the previous century. Contemporary YEC movements arose, protesting the scientific consensus established by numerous scientific disciplines, which demonstrate that the age of the universe is around 13.8 billion years, the formation of the Earth and Solar System happened around 4.6 billion years ago, and the origin of life occurred roughly 4 billion years ago.
YEC remains influential in some Christian fundamentalist circles, especially in the United States, where it continues to shape debates on science education, biblical interpretation, and the relationship between faith and science. A 2017 Gallup creationism survey found 38 percent of adults in the US held a view that "God created humans in their present form at some time within the last 10,000 years or so" when asked for their views on the origin and development of human beings; Gallup noted this was the lowest in 35 years. It was suggested the support level may be lower when poll results are adjusted after comparison with other polls that have questions which more specifically account for uncertainty and ambivalence. In 2019 Gallup found, when asking a similar question, that 40 percent of US adults held a creationist view.
Background and history
Biblical dates for creation
Young Earth creationists claim their view has its earliest roots in medieval Judaism, citing, for example, a commentary on Genesis by Ibn Ezra (–1164). That said, Shai Cherry of Vanderbilt University notes that modern Jewish theologians generally reject such literal interpretations of the written text, and that Jewish commentators who oppose some aspects of science generally accept scientific evidence that the Earth is much older. Some controversy arose among Ultra-Orthodox Jews, some of whom accept the age and some reject it. Several early Jewish scholars, including Philo, followed an allegorical interpretation of Genesis.
The most accepted and popular date of creation among young Earth creationists is 4004 BC because this date appears in the Ussher chronology. This chronology was included in many Bibles from 1701 onwards, including the authorized King James Version. The youngest ever recorded creation date in historic Jewish or Christian traditions is 3616 BC, by Yom-Tov Lipmann-Muhlhausen.William Hales New Analysis of Chronology and Geography, History and Prophecy, vol. 1, 1830, pp. 210–215. Some proponents of young Earth creationism propose dates several thousands of years earlier, by theorizing significant gaps in genealogies in chapters 5 and 11 of the Book of Genesis, e.g. 6984 BC by Alfonso X of Castile,Young's Analytical Concordance of the Holy Bible, 1879, 8th Edition, 1939 – entry under 'Creation', quoting William Hales New Analysis of Chronology and Geography, History and Prophecy, Vol. 1, 1830, p. 210 Harold Camping with 11,013 BC, and Christian Charles Josias Bunsen in the 19th century suggesting 20,000 BC.Epoch of Creation according to various authorities in Pre-Adamites by Walter Winchell, 1880
The Protestant Reformation hermeneutic inclined some Reformers, including John Calvin and Martin Luther, and later Protestants, toward a literal reading of the Bible as translated. They believed that "days" referred to in Genesis correspond to ordinary days, in contrast to reading "days" as representing longer periods of time.
Famous poets and playwrights of the Early Modern Period (1500–1800) referenced an Earth that was a few thousand years old. For example William Shakespeare:
Theophilus of Antioch, writing in the 2nd century, reckoned that "All the years from the creation of the world amount to a total of 5698 years".
Scientific Revolution and the old Earth Beginning in the 18th century, support for a young Earth declined among scientists and philosophers. New knowledge included discoveries of the Scientific Revolution and philosophies of the Age of Enlightenment. In particular, discoveries in geology required an Earth that was much older than thousands of years, and proposals such as Abraham Gottlob Werner's Neptunism attempted to incorporate what was understood from geological investigations into a coherent description of the Earth's natural history. James Hutton, now regarded as the father of modern geology, went further and opened up the concept of deep time for scientific inquiry. Rather than assuming that Earth was deteriorating from a primal state, he maintained that the Earth was infinitely old. Hutton stated:
Hutton's main line of argument was that the tremendous displacements and changes he was seeing did not happen in a short period of time by means of catastrophe, but that incremental processes of uplift and erosion happening on Earth had caused them. These processes were very gradual, hence Earth had to be ancient, in order to allow time for the changes to occur. While his ideas of Plutonism were hotly contested, scientific inquiries on competing ideas of catastrophism pushed back the age of the Earth into the millions of years – still much younger than commonly accepted by modern scientists, but much older than the young Earth of less than 10,000 years in which Biblical literalists believed.
Hutton's ideas, called uniformitarianism or gradualism, were popularized by Sir Charles Lyell in the early 19th century. The energetic advocacy and rhetoric of Lyell led to the public and scientific communities, largely accepting an ancient Earth. By this time, Reverends William Buckland, Adam Sedgwick and other early geologists had abandoned their ideas of catastrophism related to a biblical flood and confined their explanations to local floods. By the 1830s, the scientific consensus had abandoned a young Earth as a serious hypothesis.Herbert, Sandra. Charles Darwin as a prospective geological author, British Journal for the History of Science 24. 1991. pp. 170–173
John H. Mears was one of several biblical scholars proposing Biblical interpretations ranging from a series of long or indefinite periods interspersed with moments of creation to a day-age theory of indefinite 'days'. He subscribed to the latter theory (indefinite days) finding support from Yale professor James Dwight Dana, one of the fathers of mineralogy, who wrote a paper consisting of four articles named 'Science and the Bible'. Many biblical scholars reinterpreted Genesis 1 in light of Lyell's geological results, supported by a number of renowned (Christian) scientific scholars. Developmentalism, a form of theistic evolution based on Darwin's Natural selection, grew in acceptance.
This 19th century trend was contested. The scriptural geologistsThe Great Devonian Controversy, Martin J. S. Rudwick, 1988, , pp. 42–44 and founders of Victoria Institute opposed the decline of support for a biblically literal young Earth.
Christian fundamentalism and belief in a young Earth The rise of fundamentalist Christianity early in the 20th century brought rejection of evolution among fundamentalists who explained an ancient Earth through belief in the gap or in the day-age interpretation of Genesis. In 1923, George McCready Price, a Seventh-day Adventist, wrote The New Geology, a book partly inspired by the book Patriarchs and Prophets, in which Seventh-day Adventist prophet Ellen G. White described the impact of the Great Flood on the shape of the Earth. Although not an accredited geologist, Price's writings, based on reading geological texts and documents rather than field or laboratory work, provide an explicitly fundamentalist perspective on geology. The book attracted a small following. Its advocates were mainly Lutheran pastors and Seventh-day Adventists in the US. Price became popular with fundamentalists for opposition to evolution, although they continued to believe in an ancient Earth.
In the 1950s, Price's work came under severe criticism, particularly by Bernard Ramm in his book The Christian View of Science and Scripture. With J. Laurence Kulp, a geologist, and in fellowship with the Plymouth Brethren and other scientists,Radiocarbon Dating and American Evangelical Christians. Asa3.org. Retrieved 20 May 2012. Ramm influenced Christian organizations such as the American Scientific Affiliation (ASA) in not supporting flood geology.
Price's work was subsequently adapted and updated by Henry M. Morris and John C. Whitcomb Jr. in a book The Genesis Flood in 1961. Morris and Whitcomb argued that Earth was geologically recent and the Great Flood had laid down most of the geological strata in the space of a single year, reviving pre-uniformitarian arguments. Given this history, they argued, "the last refuge of the case for evolution immediately vanishes away, and the record of the rocks becomes a tremendous witness... to the holiness and justice and power of the living God of Creation!"Whitcomb, JC (1960). The Genesis Flood: The Biblical Record and Its Scientific Implications. P&R Publishing.
This became the foundation of a new generation of young Earth creationist believers, who organized themselves around Morris' Institute for Creation Research. Sister organizations such as the Creation Research Society sought to re-interpret geological formations from a young Earth creationist viewpoint. Langdon Gilkey writes:
Impact A 2006 joint statement of InterAcademy Panel on International Issues (IAP) by 68 national and international science academies enumerated many of the scientific facts that young Earth creationism contradicts, in particular that the universe, the Earth, and life are billions of years old, that each has undergone continual change over those billions of years, and that life on Earth has evolved from a common primordial origin into the diverse forms observed in the fossil record and present today. Evolutionary theory remains the only explanation that fully accounts for all the observations, measurements, data, and evidence discovered in the fields of biology, ecology, anatomy, physiology, zoology, paleontology, molecular biology, genetics, anthropology, and others.The National Science Teachers Association's position statement on the teaching of evolution. IAP Statement on the Teaching of Evolution Joint statement issued by the national science academies of 67 countries, including the United Kingdom's Royal Society (PDF file)From the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world's largest general scientific society: 2006 Statement on the Teaching of Evolution (PDF file), AAAS Denounces Anti-Evolution Laws