13th century rabbi says universe billions of years old

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 97a) says, "The world will exist for 6,000 years, and in the 7,000th year, it will be destroyed." "Sefer Ha-Temunah", a first-century Kabbalistic book by Rabbi Nehumia ben Ha-Kanah, expresses the view - not universally held - that the 7,000 years of Sanhedrin 97a run parallel to the Jewish Sabbatical cycle, in which the fields are planted for six years and left unplanted in the seventh (Leviticus 25:4). After seven Sabbatical years comes the Jubilee year (every 50th year), whose laws are similar to those of the Sabbatical year (Leviticus 25:11). The 7,000 years are thus one Sabbatical cycle within the Jubilee cycle, and the universe must exist for a total of 49,000 years. (Yes, I know that's not 15 billion years. I'm getting to that.) There is a difference of opinion regarding which Sabbatical cycle we are currently in: Derush Ohr Ha-Hayim says that we are in the second cycle, whereas Livnat Ha-Sapir says we're in the seventh. According to these opinions, then, the world would have been, respectively, either 7,000 or 42,000 years old when Adam and Eve were created.In the 13th century, Rabbi Isaac of Akko made the insight that, since Sabbatical cycles existed before man was created, time before Adam and Eve must be measured in divine years, not human years. Psalm 90:4 says, "For a thousand years in thy sight are but like yesterday when it is past, and like a watch in the night." Rabbi Isaac of Akko - who held like Livnat Ha-Sapir, that we are in the seventh Sabbatical cycle - therefore took the above figure of 42,000 years and multiplied it by 365,250 (he was using a 365.25-day year) to get 15,340,500,000 years for the age of the universe when Adam was created. This is roughly in line with what modern science is saying (15 billion years, give or take a couple billion), and Rabbi Isaac of Akko came up with it four centuries before the telescope was invented. (Today we know that there are 365.242199 days in a year. Thus, on the secular calendar, the leap year is withheld in years ending in 00, unless the year is also divisible by 400. Rabbi Isaac of Akko's calculation is thus refined to 15,340,172,358 years.)

Faith: Indeed you are correct. The present Jewish year is 5776. According to most opinions, the Messiah must come by the year 6000 (he could come earlier, if we are worthy). This will usher in the millennium, during which humanity will be perfected to the point we were at before the Fall; G-d will then re-create the heavens and the earth and raise the dead.BlueJay: The multiplication by 365,250 does not apply here. Rabbi Isaac of Akko did this only for the 42,000 years prior to the creation of Adam and Eve, and then only because there were no people.Jar, PaulK: Evolutionists are fond of asking creationists - and rightly so - how multiple means of measuring the ages of rocks and fossils give the same answer. And you emphasize: don't tell me why the dates are wrong, tell me why the methods give the SAME answer.I therefore say, in like manner, that you have ducked my point: How did a rabbi in the 13th century - 400 years before the telescope, when the Catholics were slaughtering cats to keep them from being used as familiar spirits by witches, who were surely responsible for the Bubonic Plague - analyze Bible commentaries that were already ancient in his time, and get the same answer as modern science?

"Creation in thought" is not a recent concept, but rather is mentioned multiple times in the Talmud. What exactly that means is Kabbalistic and beyond the scope of the evolution debate forum.There is no "whole range of opinions" about the age of the universe. Sefer Hatemunah mentions two opinions. Rabbi Isaac of Akko held like one opinion and had a fresh understanding of what that opinion really meant. Even if you want to call him a third opinion, it is quite a stretch to say that one of them had to be right by random chance.It was not the intention of Rabbi Isaac or the rabbis referred to in Sefer Hatemunah to say when various parts of the universe, such as the Earth, were formed. On this, Nachmanides says we don't know exactly how it was done, and those who know are forbidden to reveal it except to those initiated (that means it's Kabbalistic).

Regarding the claim that so many theologians have commented on the age of the universe that one of them had to be right (or at least close), I don't claim to be an expert on comparative religions. I'm not aware of any that claim the universe is old (except for the Greeks, who said it was infinitely old), but I could be wrong. If indeed there are, as implied, hundreds of different estimates running the gamut from a few thousand years to, let's say, the trillions, I would have to concede your point.All I claimed, as a Jew, was isn't it interesting that, within Judaism, a very respected opinion is not only close, but very close, and (as far as I know) nobody else is even in the ballpark.

It should be obvious from the mention of evenings and mornings before the Sun was made that the Bible is not speaking of literal days as we know them.