Age of the World

There are some opinions that believe evolution had something to do with Briyas Holam. Like one day in the eyes of Hashem is like 1000 and all those fossils they dig up and date back to millions and gazillions of years ago, can be older than the amount of year that passed in the Jewish calendar. Or, the idea that the continents fitted together works because before Dor Enosh there was an equal amount of land and water...ideas like these are becoming popular now.

There is a similar thought expressed by the Tiferes Yisroel. It's a controversial idea. Other Rabbonim have said this is actually Kefirah.

But two things: One, we're not talking about evolution itself. The idea is that each of the 6 days of creation could really have taken like millions of years, since nobody says that a "day" has to be 24 hours, and therefore the world could really be millions of years old.

The others hold that we have no right to concoct new definitions of a "Day", and that with such logic - that we can re-define terms - we can change a lot of the Torah c"v.

In any case, the whole idea is totally unnecessary. When Hashem created the world, He created it as a full-blown, fully developed world. Adam was created an adult; trees were already grown. The light of the stars, which take gazillions of years to reach earth, were already shining on the earth.

So if you would have looked at the world right after creation, you would have had "proof" that the world is much more than 6 days old, because for instance, Adam was obviously not just 6 days old, but a full grown man!

But the answer is that Hashem created a mature, adult, functioning world all at once, so even though the world was created 5761 years ago, it has the characteristics of a world much, much older.

So if you find let's say a tree with 8,000 rings in it, and you now a tree grows one ring each year, it doesn’t contradict the Torah 'cause the tree was created with 2,000 rings from the beginning.

Same thing with fossils and all other seemingly very old parts of the world. They were here from the beginning, already created "old" with all symptoms of being here maybe millions of years already.

So there's no need to say that the 6 days were anything but regular 24 hour days. The fossils and everything else can be adequately explained as is.

It is also true that the dating systems are highly inaccurate and subject to great controversy.

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The Torah says the world was created in 6 days. And Rashi says explicitly that when the Torah says Vayehi Erev Vayehi Voker Yom Echad it means 24 hours.

And if someone tells you a day isn’t really a day, please thank them for agreeing with you that evolution never happened. Because when they say they believe evolution did happen, tell them that according to your interpretation of their words, when they say "evolution" they don't really mean "evolution", and maybe even when they say "did" it doesn't really mean "did". And if they say you’re wrong, tell them that "wrong" doesn't really mean wrong.

The 6 days of creation were in fact 24 hours. How could they not be? Aren't days 24 hours now? So when did this change? Where does it indicate in the slightest that the first Sunday after creation (or the first Shabbos???) was suddenly shorter than previous days??

And if the days were 24 hours, would you understand why Hashem took that long? And not 2.4 seconds?? We don’t know why Hashem decided to take as long as he took, but whether it was 24 hours or 24 million hours, he could have done it in less.

When we say 1 day is like a million years, we don’t mean that Hashem is living within time. It means that the word "day" does not mean intrinsically 24 hours and could randomly mean anything.

The sun, which measures time, was created the 4th day, but time was created at the first second of creation.

It’s clear that on the fourth day Hashem said the sun should shine during the time-period that was called "day" and the stars/darkness should rule during the time-period called "night". Since then, that hasn’t changed, and obviously, as we can see today, the sun and the stars have decided that the time period called day plus the time period called night, are 24 hours.

The Gemora says this explicitly. It describes 10 things that were created on the first day of creation, one of which is the "length of the day and night" - as it says, "vayehi erev vayehi voke yom echad". So the time span of the day was created on the first day of creation. And, as Rashi states, it means "[the day and night together] - i.e. 24 hours between them".

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The world "yom" has 2 different meanings - (a) daytime, as in Yomam Valylah - in which case the Yom" is longer in the summer than the winter, using shaos zemanios; and (b) a day - an entire day, i.e. the sum total of the daytime and nightime, as in "vayehi erev vayehi voker yom sheni". That "yom" is always 24 hours, no matter what the season, shaos zemanios notwithstanding.

And so there is no reason to believe that the length of the days changed on the 4th day from what they were on the first 3.

Please note that among the Meforshim that I quoted, who address the issue of natural phenomena that need more than 6,000 years to happen - the Yaaros Devash, Divrei Chaim, Divrei Yoekl, and the unnamed Godol in "in the days of the Arizal and perhaps even earlier" - none of them saw fit to accept that the tens of thousands of years needed for that star to fulfill its orbit actually occurred. Although that answer was sitting there "on a silver platter" for them, it was not an option.

And, because of what they say, there is no reason to even want it to be an option. You gain nothing.

And the Gemora says the world is (nearly) 6,000 years old.

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Regarding answering scientists and those who have blind faith in them about the age of the world, first, just like the flaw in their "vestigial organ" logic, the entire concept of measuring the age of the world the way the scientists do is based on the assumption that the world was not created by a Creator. But if you say that the world was created the way the Torah tells us it was, that is, a full-blown world, complete with starts visible in the sky, full-grown trees and animals (and a human), a totally, fully developed and mature world, then their logic falls apart.

Because when the world was created, it already had an age. In other words, when Adam for instance was created, he was an adult, even though he was one day old; there were fully grown trees; the sun's light already reached the earth; an entire world existed, full-blown and OLD. How old was the world at the moment it was created? I don’t know -- it doesn’t say. But we do know that it didn’t start from scratch. And so lets say a "scientist" would chop down a tree 1 week after it was created and find maybe 50 rings inside - would that prove that the tree was 50 years old? To the scientists it would, and the "tree ring" concept is used as one of their "proofs" that the world is over 6,000 years old. But the truth is it proves no such thing, because when the tree was created it was created as an adult, 50 year old tree.

So even if dating would be accurate, it still doesn’t prove that the world was not created 6,000 years ago - because when it was created, it already could have been thousands or millions of quadrillions of years old.

That is the first thing to understand when dealing with the "true believers" of science. But even if they will come up with something that cannot be explained by the above, there is a Torah principle that you must know that has been used long before any of today's scientists or their grandparents were born, that tells us that although the world was in fact created 6,000 years ago, we know that it possesses all and every characteristic of a world that is much, much older. The Torah actually expects scientific measurements of the age of the universe to return an age of much, much more than 6,000 years. And we have known this for centuries.

Says the Divrei Chaim (Chanuka p.45 col. 4), “The scientists found a star whose orbit takes 36,000 years, yet the world is only 6,000 years old, as is stated in Avodah Zorah (9a) – so did He create [this star] for nothing? So the scientists ask... However, I found in a sefer of a great man, who was of the holy ones in the days of the Arizal and perhaps even much earlier than that, who brings this question and answers: It is known that the universe was once in its most perfect state, but Adam corrupted it and caused a weakness in all of creation. And therefore, at the time of creation, if not for the sin of Adam our father, the movement (orbits) would have been fast; but now, because of the flaw caused by the Sin, the orbit has to wait 36,000 years. A similar idea is expressed by the Yaaros Dvash.”

The Divrei Chaim does not tell us the location of the Yaaros Dvash. But the Divrei Yoel (Simchas Torah p.613) identifies it as being in 2 places: Vol. I, Drush 1 and Drush 15. There, it quotes a Medrash (Rabbah 10:4) that before the Sin of Adam the Mazalos operated much more rapidly. After the Sin, the Mazalos operated much slower and longer. With this Medrash, he explains the fact that we pasken that both the opinion that the world was created in Nisan, and the opinion that the world was created in Tishri, are true. Says the Yaaros Dvash: because the Mazalos operated much more rapidly before the sin, between the time the Mazalos were created on the 4th day, and the time Adam was created, on the 6th day, the Mazalos had already run their course from Nisan to Tishri.

So there you have it - the world was created only 6,000 years ago as it says in the Gemora, but according to Chazal’s statement about the pre-chet rapidity of the Mazalos, we would a measure of history to have transpired during the 6 days of creation that would currently take much, much longer than 6,000 years.

So of course the scientists are going to think the world is much older than 6,000 years. We expected they would “discover” that, long before these scientists were ever born. All the scientists are doing, if indeed their dating methods are accurate, is picking up the billions of years worth of events that transpired before the sin of Adam. But we know that all took a few days.
The mistake in their system is that they are not measuring the amount of time itself that occurred. They are identifying various events that already happened and are saying:

1) We measured the amount of time it would take this event to occur
2) And this event has already occurred
3) Therefore, the amount of time it would take to make it occur has already elapsed.

The flaw on that logic is that they only measured how much time it would take if those events would happen NOW, in the post-chet world. But since those events took place before the Chet, they took much less time, and so the occurrence of those events does not indicate the elapse of nearly as much time as the scientists think.
If they would find a way to measure time itself, meaning the amount of moments that transpired during the course of history, they would come up with 6,000 years.

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The Rishonim state explicitly that the fact that there was no sun or moon does not present a problem regarding the hours of the day, since (a) as I mentioned above, you can have a length of a day without the luminaries, and (b) the sun and stars were actually created on the first day but merely put in place on the fourth.

In any case, the fact that there was no sun or starts during the first three days does not indicate in the slightest that the days were anything other than 24 hours days.

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Carbon-14 dating rests on two assumptions. (a) that the amount of carbon-14 in the atmosphere has always been constant, and (b) its rate of decay has always been constant.

Neither of those assumptions has been proven or close to proven. And since the world was created in six days, who knows how the cosmic radiation in the atmosphere was fluctuating then.

There is another issue that makes the carbon dating useless. When the world was created, it already had an age, as discussed previously. We don't know how old it was when it was created.

So even if dating would be accurate, it still doesn’t prove that the world was not created 6,000 years ago - because when it was created, it already could have been thousands of years old.

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There are no documented civilizations going back hundreds of thousands of years. Recorded history goes back to Egypt about 4,000 years ago, before which things get murky and unknown. On the contrary - this coincides perfectly with the 5760 plus years since the creation of the world, since it would take about that long to develop a civilization like Egypt. The fact that there are NO recorded histories older than this is in itself a marvelous confirmation of the Torah, not that it needs confirmation.

Other dating techniques such as Carbon 14 and other such methods are all based on assumptions and speculative at best. No - they have not yet proven a single civilization or even artifact as being older than 5760 odd years. They won't, of course, but they can keep trying.

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If the word was always here then the sun would have already exploded and destroyed the world. This argument – that if the world is infinitely old then no matter how much time it would need for any event to happen, it already would have happened, since there was an infinite amount of time in the past, is a good argument against kadmu haolam – that opinion that the world was always here. The Ralbag in milchemes hashem uses it, as do others.

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Creation: why wasn't it done in one instant?

The question of why didn't Hashem create the world in one step is asked by Chazal. Hashem created the world in 10 steps (maamoros). Why did Hashem need 10 steps? The answer is He didn't, but He used 10 steps so that we can realize how monumental the world is. We need to realize the greatness of the world in order to understand the greatness of our Mitzvos - and the seriousness of our aveiros. Our Mitzvos maintain the world - not just any world but a world so grand that it took Hashem 10 steps to make it! Our Aveiros destroy the world - not just any world, but a world so grand that it took Hashem 10 steps to make it!

Not that Hashem needed to take 10 steps. He did it on purpose so that we can realize the impact of our actions.

It’s the same principle for creation taking 6 days as opposed to one.

As for whether there were 6 days of creation or 7 days, both are true. Sometimes Chazal use the phrase "sheshes yemei bereishis" and sometimes they use "shivas yemei bereshis". It's semantics. Technically, the world took 7 days to become what it is now, but the first 6 days were a totally different process than the 7th. The first 6 days were creation of gashmiyus, of Hashem "hiding" Himself, so to speak, making "room" for material things. On the seventh day, the opposite happened. Ruchniyus was injected into the world, Hashem "revealed" Himself instead of "hiding". The first 6 days Hashem made more and more gashmiyus, and on the seventh, He created the limitations of that Gashmiyus so that it doesn't become more material than He intended. So depending on what you mean, you can say the world was created in 6 days or in 7.

Is it worth it to us to have been created?

In the Gemora it says " . . . They counted (or voted) and concluded it would be better for man to have not been created than to have been created. Now that he is created, let him take charge of his actions."

How do you reconcile this Gemora with the Chazal that says "everything Hashem does is for the good" (Kol d'avdim min shamaya l'tav)? And since "against your will were you created", G-d is responsible. If so, how could we say it would have been better for you had G-d treated you differently?

Or even better: What about the posuk "And Hashem saw all He created and it was very good"? That includes the creation of man too.

The answer to all this is clear according to the Maharsha. He says there that all the Gemora means is that they "counted" the Mitzvos Aseh and Lo Saaseh, and found that there are more Lo Saasehs, which means that the odds of success are against a person when he is born, since there are more things that will cause him to be punished than give him reward.

However, that is why the Gemora continues "and now that he is created let him control his actions," which means that a person was given a gift from Hashem that can help him overcome the odds, namely, Free Will, which allows him to live in the world not randomly according to the odds, but according to how he wants to live.

So all the Gemora means is that the "count" of Mitzvos puts him at a disadvantage - which can be overcome by a separate advantage, i.e. free will. However, when you consider all the advantages and disadvantages, that is, his ability to overcome the odds, then it is great for him that he was created.

It's not selfish to work for Olam Habah. The Yismach Moshe says since G-d wants you to get Olam Habah, then by you doing so, you are fulfilling the will of Hashem.

"For Hashem's sake" does not mean to benefit Hashem - chas vsholom - He does not benefit from our Mitzvos. It means, rather, to do Mitzvos in order to fulfill Hashem's will. And Hashem's will is that we should get Olam Habah. Therefore, doing Mitzvos for Hashem's sake means that we have in mind that the reason we want to go to Olam Habah is because Hashem desires that.

Thus, the ultimate goal of Hashem - for us to go to Olam Habah - and the ultimate goal of ours - to do Mitzvos for Hashem's sake, go hand in hand.

The highest level is to do Mitzvos lishmah. Doing Mitzvos because you want the reward is also valid, and a high level, but just not as high as lishmah. The ultimate goal is to do mitzvos lishmah.

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What makes creating the world "good"? In order for that to be true, someone would have already created some framework for good and bad that would define creating the world as "good”, where did this framework come from?
We are mixing up two definitions of "good". When we say G-d wanted to do "good" and so He created the world we do not mean good as opposed to bad, as in morals or values. We mean good as in desirable. G-d wanted to bestow upon others that which would be desirable to them. And since what G-d would give to His creations by creating them would be a connection to Him, that by definition is desirable. G-d is Perfect, and by definition perfection is a desirable state, certainly more desirable than non-existence, but since there can be only one perfect being, G-d arranged a plan whereby others would have a desirable state of perfection a desirable state of perfection by being connected to Him.

G-d did this not because He had to in order to fulfill some kind of obligation, or because He had to "pander" to some kind of value system, but simply because it makes others happy.

So if G-d had bestowed money or some other kind of benefit on people, you would have a right to ask why is it that creating people and giving them things is something that would make G-d decide to do it, but because what G-d is giving is a connection to Himself, you have your answer right there: G-d's existence is itself perfect, meaning it is desirable, which itself creates the framework for the definition of desirability.

A beneficial, desirable prize - something people would want - already existed before the world, namely, G-d's state of existence. All G-d did was allow people to benefit from it.

If, for instance, you had the ability to put your son in a stitch where he can either (a) make a billion dollars or (b) lose $20, worst case scenario, you would be remiss in your duties as a father NOT to make him do it.

So too, we must understand, the reward for our Mitzvos - even a single Mitzvah - is soooo great that it justifies even a lifetime of doing aveiros. It’s not a question of "success" or "failure", which are black-and-white terms - it’s a question of gain vs. loss. We gain some, and we lose some. As long as do one Mitzvah on this world, your gain makes it worth your trip here, regardless of what else happens to you. If your Mitzvos count - meaning, if you are a maamin and believe in the Torah then you have accomplished so much that any price you had to pay for that mitzvah is worth it.

Of course, it would be much more pleasurable for you if you didn't have to pay such a high price.

So if Hashem created you and put you on this world, that means He knows that it is worth it for you to be here. "Risks" and all.

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The prohibition of delving into pre-creation events is not because we aren’t supposed to have questions but because we are unable to have answers. We are unable to comprehend anything outside of time and space and surely not what it was like before the word was created (indeed, there no "it" to be like anything), and chazal are telling us that if you go into this topic, you’ll end up knowing less than you do now, not more, because you will invariably misunderstand whatever it is you find. But where answers are available, they are always a good thing, not a bad thing.

But where answers are available, The Rishonim write that it makes no sense that Hashem would put us in this world, give us brains and then obligate us to be confused and doubtful. If you have no questions, that’s one thing; but if you do, you should get the answers. It is a Mitzvah to do so.

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Creation of the world: How

THE CREATION OF THE WORLD

It isn’t a simple matter to create something. In fact, it is not possible.

Before the world, there was only Hashem. In fact, Hashem WAS the world. There was no space, time, dimensions, only Hashem. We can’t even say Hashem was “everywhere”, since there was no space to say “where.” There was only Hashem.

And there can only be Hashem. Being that Hashem is perfect, it means He is, for lack of a better term, every "where”. And every “thing”. It can’t be any other way.

So you can’t really create a world, because then there is something in existence BESIDES Hashem. And if there is something besides Hashem, that means there is a “place” where Hashem is not. A physical world is not a spiritual, Perfect G-d. So where one is, the other is not.

Yet, if Hashem is every “where” (and every “thing”), how can there be “room” for a physical world?

The answer is that Hashem had a way to “make room” for the universe. This is called the “Tzimtzum” (something like “constriction”, or “limitation”). Exactly how it works is a subject of big time controversy, and it was THE primary dispute between Chassidim and Misnagdim in the days of the Vilna Gaon. (Moderator’s Disclaimer: The following explanation is not intended to touch upon this disagreement, but rather to explain, in the simplest terms possible, the basic idea. If it seems for some reason that I have “sided” with one opinion or another, it is purely unintentional.)

Basically, Hashem did not need to “make room” for the universe because the universe does not “take up” space. The universe was created not through adding something to the world, but rather by removing, or even better, by HIDING something. Hashem created the world by hiding His presence and making it APPEAR as if imperfection (that is, physical, material stuff) exists. When you create something, that usually means that you produce something where previously it was not. The “after” is more, better, than the “before”. But when Hashem created the world, it was the opposite: “Before”, there was Hashem’s light, His essence, all over. Hashem hid some of that light, made it “invisible”, blocked it from the eyes of the universe, so that where there was Perfection, there now appears to be imperfection. Where there was G-d, there now appears to be sticks and stones. Where there was infinity, there now appears to be time and space.

G-d created the universe out of darkness, or rather, the lessening, “constricting”, “limiting” of His light. The “after” of the universe is on a lower, lesser level, than the “before”.

G-d hid a certain amount of His light in a certain way, and there appeared a mountain. A different amount of light, in a different way, and there appeared a horse. It’s kind of like scratchboard – you create shapes and sizes by scratching away the ink, not by adding something. Or like making shadow images by blocking light. So too the world was created by concealment and constriction, not by additions or improvements.

Therefore, the world seems like an imperfect place, but that’s only because we are only granted the ability to see part of the light. The word “physical” really means: “where only part of G-d’s light shines”.

As an example: Where Hashem is, there is no such thing as time. Past, present, and future all happen at the same, well, for lack of a better term, “time”. Time only seems to be there because Hashem hides from us the future and the past. Imagine a piece of cardboard, with a tiny hole in it. Look through that hole at the world. You can only see part. Now move that cardboard to the right and the left. You see different parts of the landscape, one after the other, even though all parts are always there. That’s time. G-d allows us to “see” part of the picture now, another part later, another part later, another part later, like one of those binocular-machines on the observation deck of the Empire State Building. As you move it, you get different views. To us, what we view is all that exists. To Hashem, Who lives on the other side of the cardboard, kaviyochel, the entire view – past, present, and future - is visible at once.

So everything in the universe – the universe itself – is created through hiding and blocking of Hashem’s Light (i.e. His visible presence). Hashem Himself, Who exists outside of His creation, is not bound by time, place, or any physicality whatsoever.

Creation of the world: Why

WHY G-D CREATED THE WORLD

Once upon a time, there was only G-d, The Perfect Being.

Part of being G-d, part of being perfect, is being Perfectly Happy. Happiness beyond all happiness, pleasure beyond all pleasure. Something we can’t even imagine.

And G-d, being Good and Benevolent, wanted to bestow this feeling of perfect happiness on others. So He had a plan to create others that can enjoy this infinite, amazing G-d-Pleasure, just like He Himself does. But there was a problem.

You can’t enjoy this pleasure unless you are G-d Himself. It’s too great, too much, too G-dly, for anyone or anything but G-d Himself to relate to. So how can G-d give to others this pleasure that only G-d Himself can enjoy?

The answer: Create beings that have the ability to connect to G-d in such a way that they can actually be part of G-d, but with their own individual identity. Since they are part of G-d, connected to His essence, they will be able to enjoy the G-d pleasure, but only to the extent that they are connected.

So this is what He did:

He took pieces of His own essence, kaviyochol, and gave it sentience. This is called a neshomah. Since it has Hashem’s essence, it has the potential to connect back to Hashem, the same way it was separated. He gave this neshoma sentience, so it is no longer G-d, but a thinking, acting, personalized individual in and of itself. This being has the ability to connect to G-d. This being is man.

Then G-d created the means of that connection. He extracted from Himself His own essence, kaviyochol, the secrets of what makes G-d, G-d. This is the blueprint, so to speak, of Hashem Himself. If the man will develop himself, on his own, according to the blueprint, he will then be able to reconnect to G-d, and enjoy the awesome G-d pleasure that only Hashem, and, now, those who are connected to Hashem, can enjoy.

This blueprint is called the Torah.

The connection with Hashem is called Olam Habbah.

But there was more work to be done. In order to fulfill the Torah, man needed tools. There is a Mitzvah in the Torah of honoring parents. That means man will have to have parents. There is a Mitzvah to fast on Yom Kippur, so man will have to have a need for food. And the food itself would also have to be created.

In order for man to fulfill the Torah, an entire world will have to be created, and man will have to be given a physical body with which to do Mitzvos.

So Hashem created the whole, entire, physical Universe.

And then He created man. He gave him the Torah and said, “Here. This is what makes Me, Me. Nobody can be Me, but if you fulfill this, you can have what I have. All the infinite, perfect pleasure that I can create as the infinite, perfect being, can be yours. You can enjoy it through me, by becoming, once more, a part of me. You can have pleasure beyond imagining. Just do what it says here.

“This Torah, it is not just instructions. It is My holy essence. It used to be, before I gave this to you; that if someone had a she’ailah, if a woman washed a milchig dish with a fleishig sponge, she could ask Me, through a navi, what the Halachah is. I had the privilege of owning this perfection, alone.

"Now, I am giving that up. I am giving it to you. In order to enable you to connect to me, you have to own that ability. You have to be able to learn Torah, pasken sheailos, and become lamdonim. So from now on, I no longer have the privilege of ruling Halachah, of applying Torah, perfection, to the world. From now on, Torah lo bashamayim he, this ability that was Mine, that was a direct result of my being the Perfect Being, is now given to you. I gladly part with it in order to enable you to benefit from the infinite pleasure that is awaiting you.”

And so Hashem gave us the Torah.