Then God commanded, “Let the water be filled with many kinds of living beings, and let the air be filled with birds.” So God created the great sea monsters, all kinds of creatures that live in the water, and all kinds of birds. And God was pleased with what he saw. He blessed them all and told the creatures that live in the water to reproduce and to fill the sea, and he told the birds to increase in number. Then God commanded, “Let the earth produce all kinds of animal life: domestic and wild, large and small" and it was done.
But surely, everything evolved. Nothing to do with God?
1 is algae, descended from that primeval slime - the very beginnings of life.
2 is a sea cucumber; an animal but not much more than a tube; with food in at the front and poo out at the back. It has no eyes, and some varieties live in the deepest and most inhospitable parts of our oceans.
3 is a squid, descended from prehistoric creatures and still looking much like its ancient ancestors.
4 is a coelacanth (pronounced 'seal-a-canth') and that is a prehistoric creature!
Ugly brute; but what's this go to do with evolution?
On December 23rd 1938 this fish was discovered. It was an unknown species and a powerful purple colour. The woman in the picture (Marjorie Courtnay-Latimer) took it to an expert who realised that it was a coelacanth which everybody thought was extinct!
In fact, fossil records suggest the the first coelacanths appeared 410 million years ago! That makes it the oldest fishy species still surviving.
It certainly looks a bit prehistoric.
The problem is that none of these creatures has "evolved" much since, well, almost for ever. Everything has not evolved!
So living animal life began in the sea. Are you telling me that a fish walked up the beach, grew legs, started to breathe air and became a land animal? That's simply not believable.
You are absolutely right, clever teenage person. The most likely explanation is that some form of life moved from sea on to land. But no-one really knows why or how or what it was It is quite hard to imagine how a fish could decide to breathe air normally and move on to land. Why would it want to? Some people have suggested that Land Animals and Sea Animals developed at the same time.
So where does all this leave us?
It shows that, although the Bible version is very simplistic, it does suggest a progession from sea to land. And that progress is under the control of God. It may not be technically right, but, astoundingly, considering when it was written, the basics are "spot on".
But that's not evolution is it? God doing it?
Unfortunately things are not that simple. As we shall begin to see next time. The fat bloke is away this weekend so you'll have to wait a bit longer.
Next Bible Blog : Tuesday 25th September
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