Today's Reading:
Thoughts and Commentary on Today's Reading:
Did you know that Job 40 contains a powerful evidence against the Theory of Evolution? Job 40 shows that dinosaurs lived with man! Consider the following evidence:
The Bible mentions two dinosaurs by name and describes them in great
detail. "Behemoth" (Job 40:15-24) and "Leviathan" (Job 41:1-34).
From the
description found in Job, scientists have attempted to identify these
animals. They believe "Behemoth" is a Hippo and "Leviathan" is a
Crocodile. But these scientists limited their choices to non-extinct
species and did not consider the possibility of dinosaurs because man
and dinosaur never coexisted. Oh really? Even in my own personal Bible a
footnote suggests these two animals were a hippo and a crock! But there
are some obvious reasons why this conclusion is wrong.
First, "Behemoth" cannot be a Hippo because of Job 40:17 "He bends
his tail like a cedar". A hippo has a short tail like a pig. Behemoth,
had a large tail shaped like a cedar tree (large and tapered). I believe
a better choice is that Behemoth is a (Brontosaurus) type of large land
dwelling dinosaur. It fits the description perfectly.
What is significant about this is that if "Behemoth" and "Leviathan"
are dinosaurs, then is it crystal clear that Job had either seen them
personally, or there was a recent memory of them. This of course flies
in the face of current evolutionary theory.
The Paluxy River in Texas is the home of Dinosaur National Park with
hundreds of fossil dinosaur tracks. Right beside the dinosaur tracks are
three sets of human fossil footprints and a large cat track. The most
famous track is the Taylor Trail which consists of a series of 14
footprints in a left-right pattern. The stride and foot length is
consistent throughout.
The evidence is so convincing that several
university students recently presented with all the data accepted that
the human footprints were real, but doubted the dinosaur footprints were
real. All the fossil footprints in the Park are genuine. No informed
person would ever suggest that the human footprints were carved as was
irresponsibly rumored 50 years ago. It is clear that man and dinosaur
live together and co-existed at the same time. With this both science
and the Bible agree! ("Are Dinosaurs Mentioned in the Bible?")
But what about Job 41's dinosaur description? While the Behemoth description makes sense, the Leviathan of Job 41 is more difficult. It looks like a dinosaur, until one reads the verse which says it breathed fire. At that point, we're in a bit of trouble. Right? Dinosaurs didn't breathe fire. Or did they? Consider the following from Creation Worldview Ministries:
Could God have really created fire breathing dragons? Could
these creatures have coexisted with men? Could these creatures have
formed the basis for the stories of men fighting dragons?
God states in Job 41:15, 18-21:
“His strong scales are his pride, shut up as with a tight seal. . . . His sneezes [breathings] flash forth light, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. Out of his mouth go burning torches; sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils smoke goes forth, as from a boiling pot and burning rushes. His breath kindles coals, and a flame goes forth from his mouth.”
If you read all of Job 41 with some discernment and knowledge of
fossil remains, you will come to the realization that the creature
called Leviathan in Scripture is a species of Plesiosaur(idae) or Pliosaur(idae) .
These were large aquatic reptiles. These creatures grew to lengths of 43 to 56 feet long. The Plesiosaurs had particularly long necks.
There are also land dwelling dinosaurs commonly referred to as “Duckbilled Dinosaurs.” These are in the family Hadrosaur(idae), subfamily Lambeosaurinae. One specie of Lambeosaur is particularly interesting to this discussion.
The Parasaurolophus , the “Crested Lizard,” had
a single bony crest rising from its nostrils and going back over its
head, looking something like a very large curved horn. The males had a
larger crest than the females. Inside the crests were very large nasal
cavities, much larger than needed for smell.
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| Scale of a Plesiosaur, when compared with a blue whale, an orca, and a man |
First, it is important to remember that bones tell you nothing about the existence of hair, what the skin color looked like, group social habits or internal secretions. Second, God originally made animals and mankind to be vegetarians.
“Then God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed
that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit
yielding seed; it shall be food for you; and to every beast of the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food '; and it was so.” Genesis 1:29-30 NAS
What happens when you put a lot of vegetable material in a confined
space with no oxygen? The decomposition of the material produces methane
gas. Cows produce a lot of methane gas. As a matter of fact,
environmental terrorists are quick to point this out and to try to use
this information to get people to stop consuming milk, cheese and meat.
Environmental terrorists consider methane gas to be an air pollutant and
a partial cause of dreaded global warming. [The idea of global warming
is a myth. We have a serious problem with a thing dubbed “global
warming,” but that is covered in a separate article.]
In essence, cows burp methane gas. Any child raised on a farm with
cows knows about this. If you light a match and stick it in front of a
cow when it burps, you will get a mini-flame thrower.
I wouldn't recommend it because it will scare the poor cow half to death and you might get trampled along the way.
Dinosaurs had a lot of vegetable materials in their stomachs and it
would have produced a lot of methane gas. Sea dwelling reptiles could
have easily had it too, especially if they ate kelp and similar aquatic
plants. So, here we would have a source of fuel for a fire breathing
dragon.
How could an animal intentionally ignite methane gas that it breathed out of its mouth or nostrils to produce a usable flame?
Of course, there might have been a mechanical mechanism ,
such as snapping or clicking the teeth together quickly to produce a
spark similar to a flintlock rifle. Or, perhaps there was an electrical mechanism .
A series of electrical organs lining the throat similar to those of
electric eels or electric fish could have been used to ignite the gas.
Electric eels produce voltages up to 600 volts on demand. More likely,
however, there was a chemical mechanism involved. After all, it is the chemical mechanism of bioluminescence that makes fireflies light up the night sky.
Most animals (and people for that matter) have some arsenic and
phosphorous in their body systems. Under the same conditions that
produce methane gas from vegetable materials in the stomach of a cow, arsenic forms arsene gas (AsH 3 ) and phosphorous forms diphosphane gas (P 2 H 4 ). When arsene gas or diphosphane gas comes into contact with oxygen they will spontaneously ignite. This
combustive action is what causes marsh gas (which is really just
methane gas formed from the decay of vegetable materials in a swampy
environment) to ignite.
Aquatic reptiles and land dwelling dinosaurs could have produced a flame from their mouths or nostrils using such a chemical ignition system. The
purpose of such a system would most likely have been defensive in
nature; although we cannot rule out other uses, such as mating or
communication. With a little practice, proper muscle control and either
electrical or chemical secreting organs lining the inside of its bony
crest a Parasaurolophus might have been able to exercise just such a flame thrower on demand.
This is not that much different from the designed chemical process
used by bombardier beetles that produce hydrogen peroxide and
hydroquinone inside their bodies and combine them together on demand to
produce a boiling hot toxic gas. The gas is directed out of twin gun
ports with great accuracy. Bursts up to 500 times per second have been
witnessed. This process produces a highly effective deterrent to attacks
by predators.
The word “dinosaur” was coined in 1841 by the British comparative
anatomist Sir Richard Owen. Before 1841, the most common word for
dinosaur was “dragon.”
There are various references to dinosaurs in the Bible. Leviathans
are mentioned five times in Scripture; twice in Job, twice in Psalms
and once in Isaiah. Isaiah lived about 700 BC. Behemoth in Job 40:15+ is
clearly a land dwelling dinosaur. An animal called a dragon is
mentioned in the Book of Psalms. “Flying reptiles” or “flying serpents”
are mentioned twice in Isaiah.
After the close of the Old Testament ,
flying reptiles were mentioned by Aristotle, Josephus and Herodotus.
The first century naturalist, Pliny, wrote about animals bigger than
elephants living in India . When the Spaniards arrived in South America
in the 1500's they found that the Inca Indians had carvings of what we
clearly know today as dinosaurs, but these carvings were done at least
300 years before modern paleontologists described them from the fossil
evidence. Accounts of dragons and flying reptiles are found in the
literature of Persia , Scandinavia and England from the third to the
16th century A. D. The most famous of these references being St. George
and the Dragon.
The story of St. George clearly depicts a Christian man rescuing
a king's daughter from being sacrificed to a dragon in the late third
century A. D. He gave the glory to Jesus Christ for his victory over the
beast. His action and testimony convinced the local people to become
Christians and to be baptized. He became the patron saint of England in
1350.
What better way to impress a woman of your courage and strength than
to slay a fierce dragon on her behalf? Could it be that the extinction
of the dinosaurs was nothing more than the competition between men
trying to find a dragon to slay in order to get engaged? That is a
fearsome driving force. Perhaps dinosaurs became endangered species from
over hunting by men.
Were fire breathing dinosaurs created by God during the creation week? Did
man and this kind of dinosaur exist at the same time? Could the stories
of men fighting fire breathing dragons to rescue fair maidens be true?
I think it's sad that mankind spends so much time trying to disprove the historical accuracy of the Bible. Actually, time and again archaeology and science prove the historical accuracy of Scripture. And its really fun to read the Bible's historical description of these two dinosaurs, explained from an eye-witness perspective. Its a rare and in-depth look at these amazing and extinct creatures, found in the Word of God.
