Dinosaurs Redux

[Teallaura]

Why would he be shooting arrows at a skull? That does not seem plausible.

He's saying they think the artist may have depicted an actual fossil as the monster - poetic license imagining it to be alive. Since the Corinthians liked to depict animals naturalistically, a fossil skull of a dinosaur would have made a good choice for the monster stand in.

[Scrawly]

OK so far the best answer seems to be that God derived some form of pleasure from the dinosaurs?

Anyhow, I just got off the phone with a good friend who holds to the YE position and we briefly discussed this issue.

My friend more or less stated that man and dinosaurs co-existed. He speculated that the existence of dinosaurs were the result of the fall - essentially a curse of God (that thankfully we, and many other generations, are not subjected to). Anyhow, he provided four reasons:

1) Dinosaurs can potentially be seen in the Bible itself. Enter Job 40:15-24:

15“Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you;
He eats grass like an ox.

16“Behold now, his strength in his loins
And his power in the muscles of his belly.

17“He bends his tail like a cedar;
The sinews of his thighs are knit together.

18“His bones are tubes of bronze;
His limbs are like bars of iron.

19“He is the first of the ways of God;
Let his maker bring near his sword.

20“Surely the mountains bring him food,
And all the beasts of the field play there.

21“Under the lotus plants he lies down,
In the covert of the reeds and the marsh.

22“The lotus plants cover him with shade;
The willows of the brook surround him.

23“If a river rages, he is not alarmed;
He is confident, though the Jordan rushes to his mouth.

24“Can anyone capture him when he is on watch,
With barbs can anyone pierce his nose?

or the "Leviathan"

“I will not keep silence concerning his limbs,
Or his mighty strength, or his orderly frame.

13“Who can strip off his outer armor?
Who can come within his double mail?

14“Who can open the doors of his face?
Around his teeth there is terror.

15“His strong scales are his pride,
Shut up as with a tight seal.

16“One is so near to another
That no air can come between them.

17“They are joined one to another;
They clasp each other and cannot be separated.

18“His sneezes flash forth light,
And his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.

19“Out of his mouth go burning torches;
Sparks of fire leap forth.

20“Out of his nostrils smoke goes forth
As from a boiling pot and burning rushes.

21“His breath kindles coals,
And a flame goes forth from his mouth.

22“In his neck lodges strength,
And dismay leaps before him.

23“The folds of his flesh are joined together,
Firm on him and immovable.

24“His heart is as hard as a stone,
Even as hard as a lower millstone.

25“When he raises himself up, the mighty fear;
Because of the crashing they are bewildered.

26“The sword that reaches him cannot avail,
Nor the spear, the dart or the javelin.

27“He regards iron as straw,
Bronze as rotten wood.

28“The arrow cannot make him flee;
Slingstones are turned into stubble for him.

29“Clubs are regarded as stubble;
He laughs at the rattling of the javelin.

30“His underparts are like sharp potsherds;
He spreads out like a threshing sledge on the mire.

31“He makes the depths boil like a pot;
He makes the sea like a jar of ointment.

32“Behind him he makes a wake to shine;
One would think the deep to be gray-haired.

33“Nothing on earth is like him,
One made without fear.

34“He looks on everything that is high;
He is king over all the sons of pride.”

I didn't push back too much because I was more interested in hearing out the reasons he has for holding to his position. Although, he stated hippopotamus or elephants don't have tails the size of a cedar tree. The only creatures known to us today that had tails as big as a cedar tree were the largest of the known dinosaurs. He dismissed that the verses were hyperbolic (describing a crocodile, for example) and stated "why make that assumption?".

2) Heme units from hemoglobin found in a T. rex. bone. My friend stated to believe such residual blood products would survive millions of years without being fossilized utterly stretches credulity, to say the least. https://answersingenesis.org/dinosau...ing-continues/

3) In June of 1990, Hugh Miller submitted two dinosaur bone fragments to the Department of Geosciences at the University in Tucson, Arizona for carbon-14 analysis. One fragment was from an unidentified dinosaur. The other was from an Allosaurus excavated by James Hall near Grand Junction, Colorado in 1989. Miller submitted the samples without disclosing the identity of the bones. (Had the scientists known the samples actually were from dinosaurs, they would not have bothered dating them, since it is assumed dinosaurs lived millions of years ago—outside the limits of radiocarbon dating.) Interestingly, the C-14 analysis indicated that the bones were from 10,000-16,000 years old—a far cry from their alleged 60-million-year-old age (see Dahmer, et al., 1990, pp. 371-374).

4) In 1970, newspapers reported the discovery of cave paintings in Zimbabwe. The paintings were made by bushmen who ruled that area from about 1500 B.C., until a couple of hundred years ago. Along with accurate representations of the elephant and the giraffe, is a painting of an Apatosaurus (brontosaurus). These art works have apparently greatly puzzled scientists since bushmen are known to have painted from real life. My friend stated that it would have been impossible for such an accurate re-construction to be based upon fossil fragments that the bushmen came across.

[Obsidian]

I agree that dinosaurs existed in Bible times. I would even be open to the possibility that some might still exist. If you count alligators and komodo dragons and such, then certainly they still exist. The rest were probably hunted down, or died due to changing environments. Ultimately, I don't see why the dinosaur question is even an issue.

I still say that the Greeks quite firmly knew the difference between a skull and a real animal.

[Scrawly]

I agree that dinosaurs existed in Bible times. I would even be open to the possibility that some might still exist. If you count alligators and komodo dragons and such, then certainly they still exist. The rest were probably hunted down, or died due to changing environments. Ultimately, I don't see why the dinosaur question is even an issue.

I still say that the Greeks quite firmly knew the difference between a skull and a real animal.

So do you believe the dinosaurs were part of God's "good" creation? If so, how could an existence of little more than carnage and savagery be called "good"? Or do you believe they were part of the curse/fall? If so, why didn't God say anything about this curse in Genesis? Furthermore, why did God subject such a small portion of human history to experience this curse and absolve the vast majority?

[tabibito]

On the seventh day, God ended (kalah - piel imperfect) the work of creation...and rested on the seventh day ... . That says he didn't continue creating things after the sixth day. For the sake of argument - just temporarily - pretend that even the YEC rationalisation is valid:
Given that things which didn't formerly exist do come into being, which includes anything born in the time since creation, it would seem possible that "he made each to produce after its kind" sort of means that, at least ordinarily, he doesn't personally bring things into being. The plants and animals were designed to bring more of their own kind into existence.
The Genesis account, taken in isolation, would indicate that evolution itself (even in the limited form that YEC beliefs allow) is not directed by God personally.

[rogue06]

Probably the part most often cited by those who claim that the Behemoth is a dinosaur is the first part of verse 17, the description of its "tail."

17“He bends his tail like a cedar;

While "bends" and “sways” are almost always the terms used when those who think this describes a dinosaur quote this part many other translations use words/phrases like “extends,” “stiffens,” and “makes his tail stiff.” For instance:

"He makes his tail stiff like a cedar" --ESV

"His tail protrudes stiffly, like cedar" --ISV

"He stiffens his tail like a cedar" --CEB

"He makes his tail stiff like a cedar" --RSV

This makes it likely that the organ in question can be lengthened/stiffened by the Behemoth rather than just swung about (although that isn't saying that this could also happen as well). All of this suggests that the “tail” of Behemoth is really a gigantic phallus.

This view is supported by the second half of verse 17 which in many translations don't mention "thighs" but rather its "stones." "testicles" or "male organs."

"the sinews of his stones are wrapped together." --KJV

"the sinews of his male organs are wrapped together." --WBT

"the sinews of his testicles are wrapped together." --Douay-Rheims

So it is pretty clear that tail and thighs are euphemisms for male sexual organs. And what sort of creature has organs that matches this description?

Behemoth Elephant-penis.jpg

One last note on this; a bull elephant's testicles are indeed “wrapped together” internally, making them impossible to castrate in captivity.

Further, in order to turn the Behemoth into a dinosaur you have to ignore all the parts that contradict any possibility that Behemoth is a dinosaur. Those who claim that the Behemoth was a dinosaur generally claim that it was a sauropod (the massive quadrupedal dinosaurs with long necks and tails).

Job says that Behemoth ate grass (40:15) but sauropods were basically incapable of eating grass since their rows of peg or spoon-like teeth could not cope with it. Additionally the musculature of their skulls does not allow for chewing. Apatosaurus and the like had gizzards, like birds, full of stones called gastroliths, which were used for grinding the vegetation they stripped from trees. While some sauropods could have pulled up some long grass while eating low vegetation they just were not designed to "eat grass like an ox."

Verses 21 to 23 describe the Behemoth as hiding under lotus plants and reeds in the marsh. Reeds and lotus cannot hide a huge dinosaur. Moreover, the idea that this describes a sauropod are relying on the long out-dated view had them existing in marshes and swamps to support their bulk^[1]. Today we know that isn’t the case, but those who want the Behemoth to be a dinosaur still embrace this archaic view because it serves their purpose.


Now for two quick points concerning the Leviathan described in both Job and Psalms being a dinosaur.

First off it is clearly described as being a wholly aquatic sea monster whereas dinosaurs were terrestrial creatures some of which only upon occassion ventured into water for short periods of time.

Second, in Job 41 it clearly has a single head but the description in Psalms depicts it as having several. No dinosaur had multiple heads.












1 The structure of their feet also indicate that they were anything but swamp dwellers in that they would likely get trapped in such an environment. Unlike what we see on the feet of a hippopotamus (a large creature that does indeed hide among the lotus and reeds), the toes on the feet of sauropods are not splayed, but compacted together.

[rogue06]

A quick comment on this.

Carbon-14 dating can only extend back to roughly 50,000 years. You will never get a date of millions of years old from it. It is similar to taking a bowling ball and weighing it on one of those old hand held postage scales and triumphantly declaring that the 16 lb. ball only weighs a few ounces

Or trying to weigh your car on a bathroom scale and declaring that it only weighs a couple hundred pounds.

If you grossly and deliberately misuse the equipment you are definitely going to get a screwed up result -- the old GIGO adage.

[Obsidian]

The heads most likely refer to more than one leviathan/dragon.


Psalm 74
13 Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength:
thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters.
14 Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces,
and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness.


And to say that a dinosaur could not eat grass is ridiculously speculative.

[fm93]

to say that a dinosaur could not eat grass is ridiculously speculative.

How so? Scientists know what sort of anatomical features are required for a creature to be capable of eating grass, and the physical evidence indicates that the dinosaurs that people suspected "Behemoth" to refer to lacked those requisite anatomical features.

[Teallaura]

...

I still say that the Greeks quite firmly knew the difference between a skull and a real animal.

I agree - that's not what is being proposed. They didn't mistake a skull for a living monster - they used a real skull as the basis for a pictorial monster.

[rogue06]

And to say that a dinosaur could not eat grass is ridiculously speculative.

As I pointed out, the larger dinosaurs, the sauropods, didn't have suitable teeth for grazing nor was it capable of chewing. These characteristics disqualify it as a creature that "eat grass like an ox." And from what we know of its digestive system (using gastroliths) it didn't appear suitable either.

[rogue06]

I agree - that's not what is being proposed. They didn't mistake a skull for a living monster - they used a real skull as the basis for a pictorial monster.

I wouldn't be surprised if they saw the skull and concluded that it was the remains of the monster that Hercules fought or something similar and the vase commemorated the discovery of the skull. This appears to be the case with many other of the bones that they came across. They venerated them as the remains of heroes (who they often pictured as being gigantic in proportion) or of various mythical monsters.

[Teallaura]

I wouldn't be surprised if they saw the skull and concluded that it was the remains of the monster that Hercules fought or something similar and the vase commemorated the discovery of the skull. This appears to be the case with many other of the bones that they came across. They venerated them as the remains of heroes (who they often pictured as being gigantic in proportion) or of various mythical monsters.

Makes sense.

[Obsidian]

Even if they thought it was a monster that Hercules killed, they would still draw it as a living monster, not a skull. Don't be absurd.

[Scrawly]

A quick comment on this.

Carbon-14 dating can only extend back to roughly 50,000 years. You will never get a date of millions of years old from it. It is similar to taking a bowling ball and weighing it on one of those old hand held postage scales and triumphantly declaring that the 16 lb. ball only weighs a few ounces

Or trying to weigh your car on a bathroom scale and declaring that it only weighs a couple hundred pounds.

If you grossly and deliberately misuse the equipment you are definitely going to get a screwed up result -- the old GIGO adage.

Pardon my ignorance here, but if Carbon-14 dating goes back to a ballpark figure of 50,000 years then why did the Carbon-14 dating of the dinosaur bones yield only a 10,000-16,000 year range? Shouldn't the carbon dating have shown the furthest it can extend back - 50,000 years old - if the bones were in fact millions of years old?