The Fossil Record: Commending the Gnostics | The Institute for Creation Research

The Fossil Record: Commending the Gnostics

What a man does with the fossil record tells a lot about his worldview. Is it the result of a world-covering deluge? Or did this sorry chronicle of pain, suffering, and death precede humans (and the reign of death) by millions of years? A lot hangs on this question. Defending the goodness of God in a world full of suffering is a difficult job. The job is made nigh unto impossible if we place at God's feet the carnage of the fossil record.

Try to imagine God standing on His newly created Earth and calling it "very good" when under his feet lay the ruined remains of former life forms buried in various positions of agony and stages of decay. Yet all Christians who believe in an old Earth must embrace this picture. Some defend it by claiming we Americans get too sentimental over animals; only human suffering matters. Others say human suffering is, in itself, a "good" thing. Most ignore it. With the growing rise of Gnosticism, however, the question will surely not be going away soon.

Gnostics, like most religious people, have well-developed ideas on creation, "fall," and redemption. Creation to a Gnostic begins with an impersonal and vague primal god that "emanates" a few dozen deities of whom Sophia ("wisdom"), the earth goddess, is foremost. She gives birth to Jehovah and things begin to go wrong. Jehovah creates a corrupt Earth that from the start was full of suffering, pain, and death yet who attempted to pass it off as "good." Adam and Eve, having developed through Jehovah's cruel method of evolution, are also corrupt, yet they and their offspring retain a "divine spark." Only by accepting the Serpent's offer of knowledge (Gnosis) can man escape the cruel designs of Jehovah and evolve according to the promise, "ye shall be as gods." The Serpent becomes the hero. A rite of initiation among some modern Gnostics is to ritualistically eat an apple in open rebellion against their Creator.

The point is this. The Gnostic's point of departure, which is evident on any of their websites, is that only an evil god would deliberately create a world in which physical suffering is so central to his program. They feel the brunt of this more acutely than most Christians.

For three reasons I commend the Gnostics. First, they are to be commended for understanding evolution better than the Darwinists do. For man to advance to his next evolutionary stage, Gnostics see the need for information. Darwinists are utterly blind to this. Second, I commend Gnostics for their consistency. Today's animal economy, based upon "survival of the fittest," rewards cunning brutality, and predation. Young Charles Darwin felt that a god who ordained such an economy from the start is not the kind of god he was inclined to worship (and I agree). Third, I commend the Gnostics for bringing to light an issue that we ignore at our peril—the origin of physical suffering and death (human and animal).

Theistic evolutionists, progressive creationists, and all Christians who believe in an old Earth have this in common: they see in the fossil record a saga of millions of years of death, physical suffering, and bloodshed of animals that preceded Adam. In embracing this, they have no credible answer for human suffering and give fuel to the Gnostics. God's goodness must be defended. An event after the Fall sufficiently accounts for the fossil record. That event was the Genesis Flood.

* William A. Hoesch, M.S. geology, is Research Assistant in Geology at ICR.

Cite this article: William A. Hoesch, M.S. 2006. The Fossil Record: Commending the Gnostics. Acts & Facts. 35 (10).

The Latest
NEWS
May 2025 ICR Wallpaper
"Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." (Romans...

NEWS
Acoustic Communication in Animals
We are all familiar with vocalizations in the animal world. For example, dogs bark, birds sing, frogs croak, and whales send forth their own distinct...

ACTS & FACTS
Creation Kids: Crystals!
by Michael Stamp and Susan Windsor* You're never too young to be a creation scientist and explore our Creator's world. Kids, discover...

APOLOGETICS
Playing Chess with Little Furry Critters
God’s multifarious and marvelous designs for basic creature needs are so innovatively clever and providentially purposeful that Christ’s...

ACTS & FACTS
Credit Only Our Creator
History was my favorite subject as a young kid. But it always puzzled me when my teachers said, “We study history so that we don’t repeat...

ACTS & FACTS
Genomic Tandem Repeats: Where Repetition Is Purposely Adaptive
Tandem repeats (TRs) are short sequences of DNA repeated over and over again like the DNA letter sequence TACTACTAC, which is a repetition of TAC three...

ACTS & FACTS
Dinosaur National Monument: Fossil Graveyard of the Flood
Straddling the border of Utah and Colorado, Dinosaur National Monument (DNM) is one of the richest exposures of dinosaur fossils in the world.1...

ACTS & FACTS
The Transforming Influence of Genesis: Worker Dignity and Safety
When Pharisees questioned the Lord Jesus about marriage, He answered by quoting Genesis 1:27: “But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made...

NEWS
Giant ''Meg'' Shark: Longer and Leaner?
Fossil remains of the giant shark Otodus megalodon have been found in Miocene1 and Pliocene2 rock layers, which ICR scientists...

CREATION.LIVE PODCAST
Searching for Truth Across the Globe | Creation.Live Podcast:...
How can we bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the truth of creation to others outside our small spheres of influence?   Host...