i was reading an article in the Jewish Press and it was an article that these parents took their kids on Chol Hamoed to a museum and they were looking at Dinosaurs and the information said that the bones are 15 billion years old so the parents were asking this Rabbi how to explain to their kids that the world is really only 5000 something years old(i keep on forgetting the exact amount) if these things with dinosaurs say that the world is 15 billion years old.So the rabbi answered that there is a Medrash or something that there were other worlds before ours and he said the bones are from there but the ossibilty of dinsoaurs is very small - now this whole thing confuses me because how could the fossils end up on our earth and my father said maybe the dinosaur bones are just animals from the times of the beginning of creation where everything was bigger - so i pose the question - are there dinosaurs?is there any mention in Tanach or gemara about them?
Thanks Menachem

What the rabbi was saying was based on a famous piece written by the Tiferres Yisroel
in his Derush Ohr HaChayim, you can find that after Masechet Sanhedrin in a standard edition mishnayos. I saw this years ago and I don't recall the details. But there is no reason to assume that Judaism has problems with the existance of dinosaurs.

I heard a very diiferent approach by the late lubavitcher rebbi who accounted for dinosaurs by saying that Hashem created the all creations in "adult" form. therefore the earth was created as if it were millions (or billions of years old) and contained fossils.

What KInd of Fossils?
and if there are Dinosaurs why is there no mention of them in anywhere in tanach or gemara if they were so tremendously huge?

In re: dinasaur bones in the talmud
There is a description of very large bones found by a rabbi in the talmud. He ascribed them to remains of the King of Og but from the description it sounds like dinasaur bones. Note that it did not occur to the Greeks or the Romans that the very large bones occaisionally found belong to an extinct animal.

To briefly recap the usual explainations

Midrashic: Midrashim say Hashem created two worlds of ice and two of fire before this or another and there is another midrash that Hashem created thousands of worlds before this one. That there are remains of the worlds before this world is a basic kabbalistic thought. Kabbalistic calculations of the previous cycle run to hundred of millions of years.

Relativistic: Time depends where you stand. Hashem doesn't stand anywhere so our time ideas are meaningless until man appears in a specific place. Similarly, the time of described in Bereshit is divine time where, as the psalmists says, a year is like a second in your eyes.

Born old: As mentioned, some claim the world just looks old but it is not. I have always had a problem with the idea that Hashem plays games to fool people as to the actual age of the world.

Bottom line: The age of 6000 years or so for the beginning of creation is a calculation. It is not a fundimental of Judiasm nor was it ever discussed by Jewish philosophers as a important point. What is important is that Hashem created everything from nothing not when. Some jewish philosphers don't agree with that point either but the metaphysical permutations are beyond my simple comprehension.

Aryeh Shore

quote:

Originally posted by Menachem:
What KInd of Fossils?
and if there are Dinosaurs why is there no mention of them in anywhere in tanach or gemara if they were so tremendously huge?

I highly recommend Rabbi Avigdor Miller Zatzal's sefer/book titled "Sing, You Righteous" and in Chapter Six titled "Exposing the Falsifiers" he explains this topic in detail.

For more information on this and other books published by him, link here: List of Rabbi A. Miller Zatzal's Seforim

[The photo by my ID is a picture of Rabbi A. Miller ZT"L]

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Sam-,

quote:

The parents were asking this Rabbi how to explain to their kids that the world is really only 5000 something years old(i keep on forgetting the exact amount) if these things with dinosaurs say that the world is 15 billion years old.

Science claims that the universe is between 10 and 20 billion years old, whereas according to the Torah, there were 6 days of creation plus 5765 years. Rav Shimon Schwab talks of two types of time, cosmic and earthly. The 6 days of creation are counted according to cosmic time (some use the fact that the sun etc. was only created on the fourth day as proof that time could not have been measured as we measure it nowadays), during which period millions of years may have passed according to our measure of time.

There are several other approaches to this problem (I am just posting the one, due to time constraints at the moment). Almost all the opinions existed before the scientific community ever suggested a longer age for the universe, so it is not mere apologetics.

If anyone wants more information, I can post it.

Yes, please do post more. One side of the story is never good enough. And thanks for contributing to this interesting conversation.

k.

With all due respect, and speaking as a Hebrew-born secular student of religion, science, and philosophy, I can only offer what my secular mind considers relevant. And that is: The Earth is 4-5 billion years old [the universe calculated to be some 13.5 billion years in the making]. Dinosaurs ruled the surface of the Earth for millions of years. We have been around for only a few hundred thousand years in our evolutionary march to become the fittest surviving species on the food chain. The Torah is a wonderful tool in the excercise of ethics, and values, but it is comparatively new when contrasted with civilizations much more ancient than the Hebraic, while evidentiary science continues to prove its tenets.
Dinosaurs? Of course! Nature doesn't lie or fabricate - what is, IS! Judaism's 6000 odd years of Earth's existence? Faith alone must sustain such as is proffered by religious exegeses. In friendship.
Harvey Freilich

Menachem,

as Harvey said, the dinosaurs cannot be older than 200 million years - which, too, is pretty old and definitely older than the 5765 years.

One of the Midrashim says that the actual modern humans are about 6000 years old, but there were multiple species created prior to that time; however, the clock was different. It all depends on what you consider a year (we even have two years in one: Rosh Hashanah in Autumn, but first month of the year in spring). A year is not only the time it takes to complete one revolution of earth around its sun, but it is also 365 * 24 * 60 * 60 seconds. And one seconds is counted as a certain number of decay events of a pure radioactive element (Uranium, Plutonium, etc). However, that's not all. If you open Einstein's general relativity theory, then - assuming you have the sufficient mathematical background - you will find out that the rate of these decompositions depends on the mass density of the world in which they are happening, and at speeds approaching the speed of light, the speed, too, becomes a factor in how quickly uranium breaks up into plutonium and elementary particles. Another physicist, Nikolai Kozyrev from Russia, spent his entire life studying the ways to alter the flow of time, and he used gyroscopes for that. Kozyrev demosntrated that the rotational speed of the gyros may alter the flow of time, and our planet is a huge gyro. Now here's another shocker: our galaxy, the Milky way, is speeding toward another galaxy at a staggering 600 km/sec, which is as high as 0.2% of the speed of light.

Have all these parameters been the same over the entire history of the universe? Of course not. It has been demonstrated experimentally that the universe appeared as what the scientists call a singularity - in our terms, Tzimtzum - which was all the universe compressed into a single geometric point. From there, it started to expand (inflate). As you imagine, the density has been varying ever since - and it still is far from steady state. The consequence of this variation in density and variation in speed of all objects is that in their reference frame, the far-away galaxies near the edge of our universe have indeed been around for 13.5 billion years (plus or minus 5 billion). Our earth has been around for 4.5 billion years, if years are to be counted in earth's reference frame.

Nachmanides (the Ramban) taught that the moment of Hashem breathing the breath of life into Adam was the moment of the great synchronization of our clock and the "true" clock.

That said, of course there was and there is evolution. Personally, I perceive it as a means by which Hashem populated and controls large-scale species development on earth.

One of the interesting and less publicized things is that the dating of the earliest bronze antiquities pretty well matches the Genesis description of Kain's grandchildren's business: they were the first coppersmiths close to 5000 years ago. This is as far back as archaeology goes. Prior to that, it was the Stone Age, the domain of the anthropologists and paleontologists.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Alex,

Just like to point out that 6000 years is a very good starting point as it coincides with the first writing which is the beginning of history. It sure beats counting backwards, especially if there is no year zero.
Another problem in evolution is that if man was around for 100,000 years why did he wait so long to start depicting things in pictures. Apparently one day 20,000 years ago, he woke up and started thinking abstractly?

A.S.
A.S.

To Laurence Shore:

I am not sure if will help you, but in response to your querry regarding Man suddenly thinking abstractly around 20,000-years ago, there might be two things to consider here. First, the evolutionary system of reason has built in to it certain points at which time certain species undergo dramatic and sudden change. This abstract revolution of Man is one of these (again, according to the Evolutionary Picture). Second, this is a phenom that we still see in our modern world. An example of this might be the Tribes of Western African Chimps. Some of the Tribes of Chimps have been fashoning tools out of sticks and using them as spoons (to collect insects) and some some of the tribes don't. Recently (about twenty years ago), one of the tribes that DID NOT use tools (and was being watched for signs of WHY they did't) suddenly began using tools for no obvious reason. They just started. No explanation has been given for this yet, to my knowing. So the idea of a sudden and radical shift in the way a species thinks is not a particularly difficult idea. Again, I don't know if this helps, but I thought it was worth stating.
L'shalom, k.

k.,

Could it be that the chimp tribe was watching the watchers and picked up the human habit of using tools - from writing things down in a notepad, etc? You know, like in physics, there is a corollary of the Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle that when you measure a state of something, you actually disturb its state by whatever tools you use in measurement. Heisenberg formulated it for quantum mechanics, but it actually is equally applicable to any measurement.

Well i didn't want to discuss the scientific merit of the argument since I haven't read the actual paper. Observing chimps doing certain things does depend on what the observer thinks he is seeing. However most important as far a science is concerned, observations without a testable hypothesis are just observations.

Assuming however the hypothesis is correct, then we can say that one point 5700 years ago, man suddenly became conscious of time and became capable of understanding the abstract concept of the divinity creating the universe, and the existance of good and evil.

Aryeh Shore

Laurence and Alex: Good points, both. Alex, yes, you are correct in your ascertion. The chimps COULD have witnessed the observers usings hand-held tools (such as pens and paper) and began to mimick the action. Heisenberg stated that you can not observe with altering. However the point still remains, how did the Chimps suddenly decide to make and use these particular tools? None of the observers, I'm sure, were fashioning sticks into spoons and eating bugs with them. But I like your interjection of Heisenberg into this; it brings a nice color to the conversation.

Laurence, Another good point. I am not sure that I can find any obvious failing within it. The Chinese calendar is not quite 6000-years old and the Mayan and Incan calendars date back a long way, but they were written in reverse order, weren't they (i.e., starting at one point and filling in the past)? So, yeah, very interesting thought.

k.

Hi, first time poster. This is something thats really caught my interest.
As a teen i got really worked up about this and asked every rabbi and religious scientist i meet about this, and these are my feelings.
Firstly, the fact that the different braches of science, and scholars within their respective fields, cant seem to come to conclusive age, dosent give me faith in much the confidence they display. Many times they even contradict themselves, while one branch will cap the age of the world at "500 million" another will place it at no younger then "2 billion".
That said, there are still things which indicate an age more than 6000 years. eg. stars that are "x thousand" or "x million" light years away would only be visible when "x million" years have passed, yet we see them for the earth today? Fossil fuel takes many "millions" of years to fossilize? "Dinosaur" bones? etc.
One of the more frustrating things i encountered, and still encounter, in these types of discussions is "assumed scholarship". Rabbis who dont know science, scientists who dont understand torah, and more.
Eg. Many rabbis are quick to dismiss the Rambams assertion that the sun revolves around the earth, simply because "every high school student knows the earth revolves around the sun". While its true that thats what every high school student knows, because thats what their taught, i havent met one physicist who has confirmed it. Their consensus (for now), is that both could be true, we will probably never know which is true, but a solar centric system is easier for kids to understand so leave it like that until the get to university.
Many scientists are quick to suggest that the torahs time dosent mean human time, because before man was created there was a different reference of time. Most often they will attempt to back up their claim with some Medrashic or Kabbalitic statement (given to them by the Rabbis who dont understand science), twisted to fit the point their making.
This hypothesis (as well as many others) just dosent fit in with the text, and often not with logic. To say that the "day" mentioned in the torah before mans creation is some how longer than the "day" after creation distorts the simple meaning of the verses and causes much confusion. eg. it would distort the "6 days of work" and 7th day of rest cycle, hence confusing the mitzvah of shabbos. the sun etc. was hung on the fourth day (before mans creation) and has been moving steadily ever since (yerushalmi brochos). the gemmara states the world was created on the 25th of elul. "molod tohu" is considered a full year because "miktzas hashana k'kulhu". etc etc. all of these would indicate that the “six days” were 6 twenty four hour cycles.
I guess my problem is that i dont know enough science and not nearly enough torah to have any certain answers. But i know enough of both not to be fooled by pompous scientists or creative rabbis.
I guess ill just weave my comments into A Shores summary (posted above).
Midrashic: All interpretations of previous "worlds" somehow accounting for the age of the universe are laughable. They were all speaking of spiritual plains, where dinosaurs didn’t exist. Just as the four basic "worlds" that are discussed in Kabbala are spiritual, so are the "fire" and "water" (extreme judgment and loving-kindness respectively) worlds discussed in midrash. Laughable indeed.
Relativistic: Besides not making sense, why would Hashem need any more than a moment to create somthing. With hashems infinite power why would he need "millions" of years to create something finite. (see raysh lakishes statement to this affect in midrash berashis. the obvious question then would be why six days, but thats not for now). It is also bad torah, seeing that the term "one day" is used. Amongst the other reasons brought above. Why would Hashem misled us by using the same term to mean contradictory things in the same passage?
Born old: The Midrash seems to indicate this answer, when it says that adam was created a man of 20, all animals were created full grown. i guess we could extrapolate that trees were created centuries old and stars were created with their rays shining onto the earth, as if theyd been like that forever. it would also explain fossil fuel. From a scientific stand point it would be difficult to refute this theory. But, as aryeh mentioned, it has interesting philosophical implications. Why would hashem fool us? i recently came across a new book on torah and science, "chochmas yisroel" (hebrew) where the author touches upon this issue, amongst many other (mostly astronomical). He suggests (i forget his name) that quite the contrary, how could it be any other way? What kind of choice would Hashem be leaving us has he created the world to look no more than 6000 years old? it would leave no other choice, outside the creationalist theory. And besides, the world would have to be void of many vital minerals, fossil fuels etc. if it were to be only 6000 years old.
Just my thoughts.

Dear Yona,

Your confusion stems from your trying to perform critical analysis which can't be done for creation anymore than jewish philosphy can be justified by using philosophical principles. What can be done is to show that science or philosophy does not contradict torah principles.

The midrashim dealing with the many worlds and the four worlds are midrashim and not kabballah. The idea that a year is a second before hashem is in tehillim not the kabballah. It is correct that kabbalistic calculations are not talking about physical reality. The idea is that such speculation is not outside jewish thought.

I am a scientist and I have learned all of the talmud. The explanations are not going to get any better.

Although science changes and by definition must change since it is not a dogma, somethings are certain. DNA is the code of life. Whether aspirin is good or bad for you will be changed many times.

As for the earth revolving around the sun, the scientist wants to say it is not exact. The earth and the sun revolve around a common point which happens to be inside the sun. The earth and the moon also revolve around a common point.

As for understanding the science or medicine in the gemara, you can find ample achronim that the rabbis in the gemara expressed themselves in the science of their time.

Ayreh Shore

Dear Aryeh,

Glad to make your acquaintance. What type of scientist are you?
Im still thinking over what you wrote, but when you say year to Hashem is like a second are you referring to psalms 90? Im also slightly puzzled about the relevance of this verse to our discussion. Even though a thousand years to Hashem is like a day, that wouldn't mean that every time the torah speaks of a day it means one thousand year.
Thanks for the food for thought
Yona

Dear Yona,

Of course the "100 years == 1 day" is a just poetic representation of what is really going on. Of course the achronim did not have the modern sophisticated tools for measurement the qualities of time. The first scientist to do that with any measure of success was Nikolai Kozyrev from the Soviet Academy of Sciences, who started his work in the 40s and got a semblance of results in the 60s. If you do a google search for "Kozyrev Mirrors", you will find some references. Very interesting reading. However, since the early 20th century, the physicists agreed that time is not an absolute measure of anything, but is one of the independent variables of the space-time continuum. In this sense, time is very similar to entropy: just as there is no absolute measure of time available to us, there is no absolute measure of entropy: we only know that it is a measure of chaos (absense of correlation), and we know that it never decreases in a closed system. Similarly, time is a measure of correlation between any two events (e.g., action and reaction). That brings on some more fundamental thoughts about time being the opposite of entropy, but let's leave that out for now)

That said, even if science today can identify the sequence of events 10 to the -40 power of a second after the Big Bang, the question stays: what is a second? The second at the early post-Big-Bang events was much longer than the second we experience today, because all the mass of the universe was collected into one singularity (the famous Tzimtzum), and jsut as the faster you go, the slower your time runs, so the higher the gravity around you (mass density), the slower your time runs.

Sorry; please disregard one of these two posts above: for some reason, I can't edit today: must be something with my browser.