Starlight and the Age of the Universe

Years ago, our small country congregation was challenged to a Biblical debate. Some congregants of another church told one of our young believers, "Bring your pastor and we’ll straighten out your doctrinal errors." What presumption! Never having attended our full-Gospel, non-denominational congregation, neither knowing what we taught, they were going to correct our errors. Being the co-pastor at that time, I felt compelled to go for the sake of the young believer in the middle of the challenge. I arrived at the meeting with several other brothers, our majority-text King James Bible in hand. The challengers arrived with a stack of a dozen or more books. Prior to the meeting, I instructed the brethren of two possible scenarios that could result from this confrontation, and in both instances we would win: One, they would instruct us more perfectly in righteousness in which case we would win; or two, it would be the other way around. We came prepared to hear their position from the Word of God.

At the outset of the meeting, in which they had already assumed the role of teacher and us as their errant students, I raised my hand to ask two questions. Question number one: "Will you recognize the Authorized King James Bible on grounds of age and scholarship to be the final and only authority?" They said they would. Question number two: "Will you agree that no thought will be allowed to stand unless it can be fully supported with chapter and verse?" They said they agreed. Of course, by answering "yes" to both questions, they were reduced to one book, which is the Word of God—the same one book with which we entered the meeting. The debate began and they were quickly flummoxed. Their game plan was destroyed. In the discussion, they entered an opinion several times from one of their scholars, to which we quickly pointed out that we looked and couldn’t find a book in the Bible by his name. Once opinion was destroyed, confusion lifted. They couldn’t defend their positions, which were built upon the opinionated teachings and traditions of their church.

The debate ended with the challengers leaving in a huff. Ironically, they left us with an old, wheelchair-bound woman, the owner of the home, who was also one of their parishioners. They had bought her the wheelchair. We laid hands upon the old sister and prayed for her and she got up out of the chair. We never saw any of them again.

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Several months ago, we entered a feature on this website titled "Chicken or the Egg and Starlight." Parts of that subject will be revisited with some interesting new updates.

GOD SAID in His Holy Bible that the earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars are just over 6,000 years old. This number is established by following the time spans listed in the Bible between father and son until you reach Jesus Christ and from there, it’s a matter of simple math. The ancient Bishop Usher used this technique to date the earth and, of course, it dates just over 6,000 years of age. In regard to today’s subject, Genesis 1:14-19 reads:

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:

15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.

16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.

17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,

18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

MAN SAID: The idea that the earth is just over 6,000 years old is ridiculous! The very fact that many stars are estimated to be millions if not billions of light years away, yet we see their light, should reduce the Bible’s “young earth” argument to nothing.

Now THE RECORD: What if Einstein’s theory of general relativity and the speed of light being constant were wrong? Scientist Joao Magueijo has been making news since he challenged Einstein’s theory in 1995. He challenged Einstein just as Einstein had challenged Newton before him. A major feature story concerning Magueijo and his challenge was recently published in the April 2003 edition of Discover magazine. The following excerpt is from that article:

But Magueijo never liked inflation theory. The idea that the universe expanded from a subatomic mote in less than a billionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second seemed unlikely at best to him, and there are obvious problems with the theory. It relies on a mysterious inflationary field and a weird antigravity particle called an inflation, neither of which has ever been detected. Mageuijo decided there must be a better explanation, and on that wet winter morning eight years ago, it came to him. Cosmologists wouldn’t need to invoke inflation if they could bring themselves to give up one of their most sacrosanct laws: The speed of light is, it was, and ever shall be 186,282 miles per second.

Magueijo now believes that for a few moments at the beginning of time, the universe’s extreme heat made photons—particles of light—zip along much faster than 186,282 miles per second, at almost infinite velocities. Then, as the universe began to expand and cool, its physical properties abruptly changed, just as water suddenly transforms into ice at the freezing point. When the temperature dropped below a critical transition value, light "froze" at the lower speed we now observe. [End of quote]

Scientist Magueijo’s new theory became known as the varying speed-of-light theory. Again from the article:

Magueijo says his theory can match inflation’s accomplishments and insists inflation rests on shaky ground. "The inflationary field is a mysterious thing no one has ever seen," he says. "VSL is exactly the opposite. We don’t introduce anything new in the universe in terms of ingredients. We just say the physics were different early on." Besides, he says, it’s unfair to compare a two-decades-old theory like inflation with his new-born brainchild. "Things are normally not very pretty when they first come into the world. It’s true of humans, it’s true of everything. Then we start growing. A few hairs here and there; things start looking a bit better."

Majueijo’s baby started looking much better two years ago. That was when a discovery by John Webb, an astronomer at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, made headlines around the world. It read, "If the results are correct," Turner says, "this is certainly one of the most important discoveries in the last 100 years."

Webb used data collected by the world’s most powerful telescope—the Keck, perched on the summit of Mauna Kea, 13,796 feet up on the Big Island of Hawaii. He looked at light from 68 quasars—extremely bright young galaxies—as much as 12 billion light-years from Earth. During the light’s long journey to Earth, it passed through clouds of intergalactic gas. In doing so, the light’s spectra changed, depending on the chemical elements in the clouds. [End of quote]

The following excerpt is from the GodSaidManSaid feature, "Chicken or the Egg and Starlight:"

The argument of distant stars and starlight has succeeded in penetrating the world’s psyche as the many questions on this matter reaching this website attest to. The following question concerning starlight is typical. It reads:

I think that this is a great site, but there is something that I have been thinking about: if the universe is only 6,000 years old, then how could light have traveled from those very distant galaxies in that amount of time? I know that light from close things could have easily traveled in that time, but what about those things which are so far away, yet we can see them?

The answer to this question is surprisingly simple and, of course, it is found in the Word of God.

Slightly over 6,000 years ago, Adam was created by God a fully mature man and Eve was made a fully mature woman. By today’s standard, a man is fully developed around the age of 33. By today’s standard then, Adam opened his eyes for the first time and appeared to be about 33 years old when in fact he was only seconds old. Eve opened her eyes a fully developed woman but also was only seconds old.

All of God’s creation was created fully mature and fully functioning. The seas and their tides and boundaries were created fully mature and fully functioning. The grass, the herbs, the trees, and the trees bearing fruit were created fully mature and fully functioning. On the fourth day of creation, God created the sun, moon, and stars and set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth. As in all of creation, they were fully mature and fully functioning. Not only was their purpose to give light and the energy of life, but also for signs, seasons, and for days and years. The sunlight, the moonlight, and the starlight were created by God fully mature and fully functioning. Their lights were shining on the earth in the beginning of their creation, at the very first moments. The light from some stars appears to be millions or even billions of years away but their light was fully mature and fully functioning on the very first day of their creation—already here, giving their light upon the earth and fulfilling their specific designated jobs. The light beam on the day of its creation appeared to be billions of light years old when in fact it was just seconds. [End of quote]

Now a new scientific theory is beginning to line up in suggesting that, in the beginning, the speed of light was not 186,282 miles per second but rather almost infinite. In other words: fully mature and fully functioning.

In all due respect to scientist Joao Magueijo, his idea is not entirely new. This excerpt is taken from an article in Journal of the Optical Society of America, in August 1953, titled "Binary Stars and the Velocity of Light:"

The acceptance of Riemannian space allows us to reject Einstein’s relativity and to keep all the ordinary ideas of time and all the ideas of Euclidean space out to a distance of a few light years. Astronomical space remains Euclidean for material bodies, but light is considered to travel in Riemannian space. In this way the time required for light to reach us from the most distant stars is only 15 years. [End of quote]

So much for the billions-of-years-old earth and universe theory using starlight as their proof. The earth is just over 6,000 years old and we prove it over and over again. For 6,000 years, carnal minds have been attempting to disprove the Holy Bible by claiming it was written by mere men. Every time, they have failed miserably. God’s Word stands supreme because God’s Word is God.

GOD SAID that the universe is just over 6,000 years of age.

MAN SAID: The idea that the earth is just over 6,000 years old is ridiculous! The very fact that many stars are estimated to be millions if not billions of light years away, yet we see their light, should reduce the Bible’s “young earth” argument to nothing.

Now you have THE RECORD.




References:

Authorized King James Version

Folger, T., "At the Speed of Light," Discover, April 2003

Morris, H.M., That Their Words May Be Used Against Them, Master Books, Copyright 1997

GodSaidManSaid, "Chicken or the Egg & Starlight"

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