You asked...
> At what point does Christians agree
> about the historicity in bible
> (especially about the age of the
> earth)?
> If one follow the genealogical tree
> in the Old Testament, the earth cannot
> be very old.
It is common for Christians to believe that the earth is not very old
because the Geneologies from Adam to Yeshua (Jesus) only account for
about 4,000 years. Believing the Old Earth Creationism (OEC) view, I do
not think there is any reason to believe that the age of earth or of the
universe can be inferred from those geneologies. I do believe that Adam
lived somewhere between 6 and 50 thousand years ago, but that the
universe was created by G-d 15 billion years or so ago and earth was
created a little over 4.5 billion years ago. (It should always be
remembered that the geneologies apply to the lineage of human families
and not to the natural order.)
You also asked...
> Does OEC and evolutionist suppose,
> that there is a timegap in the
> genealogical tree at some point in
> OT?
Although Jewish tradition tells us that there *are* gaps in the
geneologies, it is impossible to say where they are and how much
time-compression has occured. The OEC view is indifferent to this point
because the antiquity of the natural order is based upon the wording of
the creation story together with the hard evidence provided by the
various sciences. The *BIG* gap (on the order of billions of years)
does not come within the geneology; it is actually divided among the
creation days. These days were of varying spans of time with ten
billion years passing between the creation of the heavens (the universe)
and earth in Gen. 1:1. Gaps in the geneologies only serve to push back
the date for Adam, not the beginning of the natural order.
Although there is wide disagreement among OECers and TEers about the
flood, I think all agree more or less to traditional dates for events
from Abraham onward. On the flood, my position is that it was probably
the filling of the Black Sea basin that occured about 7,500+/- years
ago, but Glenn Morton (TE) holds that the flood story refers to the
filling of the Mediterranean Sea basin which occured about 5.5 million
years ago. Astrophycisist Dr. Hugh Ross (OEC) believes in a more
traditional view that it was a flood of the Mesopotamian plain about 3
to 4 thousand years ago. Whichever it was (of these or some other), we
are all pretty much in agreement that the story is not mythical--that
there was a flood and that it had a tremendous impact on human
civilization.
I recommend the following two web sites to investigate the OEC view and
the debate over Intelligent Design that is occuring in the scientific
community:
http://www.reasons.org Dr. Hugh Ross' organization Reasons to Believe
http://www.origins.org theism/intelligent design articles etc.
May the L-rd richly bless and keep you.
Russ
Russell T. Cannon
rcannon@usa.net