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Time Gaps in Scripture

The gap between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 that is believed by myself and others for scriptural reasons is being erroneously labeled a grave heresy by some. One of the claims against such a belief is the purported foolishness of placing a gap of interminable length between two verses without any statement that there is this gap. I want to thank Walter Scott of Canada for providing several excellent examples of just this kind of gap in other scriptures. Here are some of his examples.

Psalm 8:5 states, "For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour." The first half of the verse refers to the incarnation of Christ; the last half to His glorification.

Isaiah 61:2 reads, "To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn." The first part of the verse (and the previous verse) refers to the first coming of Christ; the last part to His second coming.

Daniel 9:26 states, "And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined." This verse begins with the crucifixion of Christ and then with a simple punctuation skips to the tribulation period.

Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 are at least separated by a period. In the three examples above, two verses separate events that are many years apart by a simple comma and the other by a colon. Early proponents of the gap wrongly used it to explain the geological ages and to accommodate science. Opposing this accommodation is certainly the motivation for those calling the gap a heresy. However, there are some serious biblical reasons to make us consider an original creation of God's heaven, the creation of the angelic beings, and other events (as the fall of Satan) which are never mentioned in the six-day creation account, as occuring at an earlier time.