[quote=“jammycakes, post:132, topic:4219”]
I shall just refer you to this blog post. The author addresses this very question as well as anyone else I’ve seen. Oh, and by the way, he is a young-earth creationist.
[/quote]If that’s the best you have to address this particular argument, then you don’t have much because you notice that he doesn’t actually address the argument and the evidence regarding the specific hypothesis put forth. I agree with most of what he says. In fact, his article on One Reason I Am Skeptical of an Ancient Earth makes a point I have been trying to make here about the use of ancient data and models and extrapolation. I think his point is overlooked or ignored.
But here’s a problem: He gives an example to refute the hypothesis concerning the use of YOM in Genesis 1. His example is Hos 6:1-2, which he is correct is a use of YOM modified by numbers. So far so good. But he misses the fact that YOM in Genesis is singular absolute; in Hosea is a plural in the first case and a construct with a prefix preposition in the second case. That’s a key point of the argument (whether it is valid argument or not). The argument has to be addressed on that point by showing somehow that the singular absolute doesn’t mean anything. So his comparison text isn’t actually a similar text. The construction in Hosea is the one normally used to refer to long periods of time. That doesn’t prove the “rule” (and I use that loosely). But it does show that Hosea is not a valid comparison text.
(It’s also a problem that he quote Geisler as an expert on Hebrew.)
[quote=“jammycakes, post:132, topic:4219”]
On the contrary, one should be very wary of arguments that only come from people who have a vested commercial interest in them. Otherwise the tobacco companies could publish studies that show smoking doesn’t cause cancer and we’d all just take them at face value.
[/quote]I would encourage you to be wary. But no one is asking you to take this at face value. To the contrary, I am saying “Let’s examine it. Show me some evidence that disproves it.” You haven’t done that yet. You have simply rejected it at face value, which is just as bad as accepting it at face value.
[quote=“jammycakes, post:132, topic:4219”]
Can you give me a reference for the “yom with a number” rule that is verifiably independent of, and free from influence by, the teachings of the young-earth organisations?
[/quote]No. But I don’t keep up with Hebrew studies these days and I don’t know that anyone else has ever looked at it. Can you give me any Hebrew scholar who refutes it with evidence and argument that is independent of and free from influence by evolutionary organizations? Or name any Hebrew scholar who has interacted with it? I think the answer is no. Can we really believe that BioLogos is objective and free from a stake in the outcome of the debate? They can’t afford to give any credit to a YEC, no matter the strength of the argument. I would love to see a Hebrew scholar use a scholarly method to review and critique the position put forth by Hasel and McCabe.
But this is irrelevant as I have said (no, I haven’t refused to answer it). Why should you reject a hypothesis simply because you don’t like its source? Why not examine the evidence and see if the evidence takes you somewhere. If it doesn’t, fine. But so far, you haven’t examined the evidence. You have simply said in essence, “A YEC said it. I don’t need to consider it.” That is bad method.
[quote=“jammycakes, post:132, topic:4219”]
If not, can you explain why nobody discovered it earlier, despite the fact that there was no shortage of very smart and very determined people with a fairly strong motivation to look for arguments such as this years before?
[/quote]I don’t know that nobody discovered it earlier and unless you know everything that has ever been said about Hebrew, you don’t either. But more importantly, science and theology are subjects of research and development. That’s how you get a research or academic doctorate. So we should expect new discoveries and new applications of old discoveries. Your question can be asked of anything in history and then used to refute it. The theories of evolution are relatively new (and constantly developing). Should those of past eras have rejected it simply because no one had ever said it before? You would say no. So why is this different?
Again, no one is asking you to take something at face value uncritically. To the contrary, I am simply saying we should examine the evidence and see where it leads us. Will you examine the evidence without bias and see what it says? It doesn’t require you to become a YEC. To me, the framework theory (which is widely held) could fit very comfortably in the argument made about the days in Genesis 1. So I am not overly concerned about that. But we should at least examine the evidence before rejecting it on the basis of a byline.
