"God told Abraham that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore ,"Genesis 22:17
E-mail sent to me:
A fantastic photo. Yes, I find
astronomy very interesting even though I know very little about the
subject. I read in the newspapers that new stars are being discovered almost
daily which to me supports what God told Abraham that his descendants will be as
numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore
,"Genesis 22:17. Thanks for the Hubble Telescope photos showing new stars
being created.
My Reply:
You are right -- Modem Astronomy which is data based is really fascinating.
God told Abraham that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore ,"Genesis 22:17
Most interesting verse!!
God was not literal here, but meant "many descendents".
The number of stars in the see-able universe is (I used to have my students work this out from data, by first calculating the mass and number of stars in our galaxy (milky way)):
There are over 400 billion stars in our galaxy.
There are over 100 billion galaxies in the see-able part of our universe. (14 billion light-years in all directions from us)
Multiplying these 2 numbers gives you 4 with 22 zeros after it. That is about 10 trillion times the number of people on Earth at the moment.
Our Universe has been found to be flat in space-time meaning that it extends outward in all directions to infinity.
There are, therefore, an enormous number of spaces the size of our observable part of the Universe filled with a star density the same as in our part of the galaxy (large scale star structure have been found to be very large but do have a limit), so the number before (in Red) has to be multiplied by a number approaching infinity. This is known. There is evidence that there are an infinite number of universes, an infinite fraction of these with stars. Astronomical evidence indicate that this multiverse has existed forever and extends infinitely far.
This number of stars is tremendously much larger than the number of sand particles on earth. Even if the whole of earth (5.98 times 1 with 24 zeros after it kg) was sand, the number of sand particles would be 2.9 X 10 to the 41st power. A puny number compared to the number of stars. It's strange that God would even mention sand when stars are much, much more numerous.
So, you have to conclude that God meant "many", not "numerous as the stars in the sky".
On the other hand the number of stars you can see with only your unaided eyes is a few thousand. If that was what was meant then the sand part, again, wouldn't make sense. Abraham's God must have meant the much higher number (which in it's own way doesn't make sense).
Response:
God who existed before Universes were created
is Absolutely Infinite. He continues to confound scientists, astronomers,
philosophers about His creation .The discovery of more
not new phenomena in the infinite universes will baffle humankind forever.. Some
of the most renowned scientists such as Hawkins, Einstein change their views to
the extent that they acknowledge that there must be Infinite Intelligence that
created the Universes.
My Reply:
Thanks for your response.
The discovery of more not new phenomena in the infinite universes will baffle humankind forever.
You are right! I don't know about philosophers, but I can say this about Scientists and science -- all scientific knowledge is provisional.
In science the more evidence that supports a theory the more true it is -- when the amount of evidence is high the theory is a fact -- all knowledge is provisional from the scientific perspective -- Even the theory of the roundness of the Earth has a lot of evidence to support it --it is considered a fact -- however in science it is still provisional -- allowing for any new evidence to overthrow it. Similarly the overwhelming evidence of Darwinian Evolution that permeates all of science, including Biology, Astronomy, Geology, makes the Darwinian Evolution theory, a fact, yet provisional.
In other words there are no absolutes in science, even when no exception exists, for instance, for a law in Physics.
This makes science so powerful.
Addendum: Einstein and Hawkins meant something quite different than what the respondent had in mind regarding "Infinite Intelligence"