DINOSAURS AND THE BIBLE

SHEPHERD TO SHEEP

DINOSAURS AND THE BIBLE

What does the Bible say about dinosaurs?  That is the million dollar question because evolutionists say that dinosaurs died off before man came on the scene.  But remember that according to the Genesis account on the sixth day of creation animals as well as humans were created.  So that means they had to have co-existed.  

There are three terms to consider that may point to dinosaurs in the Hebrew Old Testament:

BEHEMOTH: (Job 40:15-19) “Look now at the behemoth, which I made along with you; He eats grass like an ox. 16 See now, his strength is in his hips, And his power is in his stomach muscles. 17 He moves his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit. 18 His bones are like beams of bronze, His ribs like bars of iron. 19 He is the first of the ways of God; Only He who made him can bring near His sword.  Although some Bible scholars say this may have been an elephant or even a hippopotamus, the description actually fits that of a dinosaur like Brachiosaurus. Elephants and hippos certainly do not have tails like cedar trees (v. 17)!

LEVIATHAN: Job 41:1–34 describes the twisting, serpent-like Leviathan in terms of a fierce, fire breathing sea monster: "His sneezings flash forth light ... Out of his mouth go flaming torches; sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils comes forth smoke ... His breath kindles coals, and a flame comes forth from his mouth." (ESV)  These mysterious creatures defy cataloging and have therefore led some commentators to think the Bible writers may have been offering  descriptions of dinosaurs.  

DRAGON: (Psa 74:13) You divided the sea by Your strength; You broke the heads of the sea serpents in the waters.  The Hebrew word for dragon is tanniyn and occurs 28 times in the Bible. It is also translated “serpent,” “sea monster,” “dinosaur,” “great creature,” and “reptile.” Behemoth and Leviathan are relatively detailed creatures, perhaps each was a single kind of animal. Tanniyn is a more general term, and it can be thought of as the old word for dinosaur. (The word “dinosaur” was originally coined in 1841, more than three thousand years after the Bible first referred to “tanniyn.”)

What ever happened to dinosaurs?  Some say they died off before the flood.  If that wasn’t the case we know from Genesis 6-9 the flood killed off every land animal and, we may surmise,  wiped out many sea creatures (thus accounting for the many fossils of dinosaurs).  Perhaps dinosaurs entered the ark of Noah in young adult form and then died off after the flood.  The new world must have been hostile to their survival.  Food was scarce and they would have been hunted for food, as one of the realities of the post-flood world was that meat was now eaten along with plants: (Gen 9:3) Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.  

Louie