THREAD ALERT

DINOSAURS

In this thread, I will answer these questions:

Did they exist?
What caused extinction?
Are dinosaurs mentioned in the Bible?

I’m sure there may be more questions about this topic. I’ll try to answer questions the best I can.

1/ Many people have questions regarding the existence and/or origins of dinosaurs. We have been lied to so much by “science” that we question everything now. If you add millions of years to any timeline, anything sounds plausible. Who would know if it was true? No one was there.

2/ Did dinosaurs exist? God created the creatures that today we call dinosaurs on the final day of creation. He made plants on Day 3, stars on Day 4, then air and sea creatures on Day 5. It was on Day 6 that God made the creatures that live on land large and small.

3/ Dinosaurs walked on land and were therefore created on Day 6. The key verse on this point is Genesis 1:25: “And God made the beast of the earth according to its kind...” Dinosaurs certainly qualified as “beast[s] of the earth.”

4/ God created flying creatures on Day 5, including flying reptiles. Their fossils are known as pterosaurs, but there is plenty of evidence throughout ancient history that people living near them called them various names, including “dragon.”

5/ In addition to birds, bats, and flying reptiles, God also created all the creatures of the sea on Day 5. Genesis 1:21 calls special attention to the “tanniym” which is translated as “dragon,” “sea monster,” or “serpent.”

6/ How did they die off? The two main reasons why animals go extinct today should likewise apply to dinosaur extinction—loss of habitat and human hunting. When humans settle an area, they remove the threats to their children’s safety.

7/ What is Behemoth? Job 40:15-24 - “Look now at the behemoth, which I made along with you...” It was a gigantic plant-eater with great muscles and very strong bones. Their tails were as large as a cedar tree. Sounds like a dinosaur to me.

8/ Job may well have been looking at the creature while God was speaking since in Job 40:15 God told him to “look now at” it. In the same verse, God specified that He made behemoth “along with you.” This means that He made both man and behemoth during the same time period.

9/ What was Leviathan? The very next chapter in Job describes another creature. This one was certainly a reptile, and certainly massive. Like behemoth, leviathan probably no longer exists. But unlike behemoth, which lived in marshes, this one swam in the sea (Job 41:31).

10/ Leviathan’s scale-packed hide (v. 15) was so tough that it repelled spears (v. 7). It was so large and powerful that it struck instant fear in the heart of any onlooker (v. 9). It had a nose (v. 2), so we know that it had to surface to breathe.

11/ Terrible teeth rimmed its mouth (v. 14). Leviathan also had bright eyes (v. 18) and breathed fire from its mouth (v. 19), while its nostrils issued smoke (v. 20). According to Psalm 104:26, leviathan disrupted ancient shipping lanes.

12/ The word “leviathan” likely derives from two Hebrew words meaning “wreathed” and “dragon.” The Gesenius Lexicon defines leviathan as “an (animal), wreathed, twisted in folds.”

13/ What Was Nachash Saraph? Numbers 21 relates a particular incident during the Israelites’ decades-long wandering in the wilderness. When they spoke out against God, He sent “fiery serpents” (Hebrew nachash saraph) among them that killed many.

14/ Most assume they were ordinary snakes, but that doesn’t make sense of all the biblical data. If that were the case, couldn’t the people have simply stepped out of the way? While descending a desert trail recently, my right foot came within an inch of a huge rattlesnake.

15/ It is amazing how fast even an exhausted person can move when he suddenly encounters a venomous serpent. I imagine that the ancient Israelites were at least as agile as I am. This and other clues open the possibility that the animals in Numbers 21 were flying serpents.

16/ Isaiah 14:29 says, “Do not rejoice, all you of Philistia, because the rod that struck you is broken; for out of the serpent’s roots will come forth a viper, and its offspring will be a fiery flying serpent.”

17/ They may be extinct today, but flying serpents certainly lived in the past. Fossil flying reptiles are known as pterosaurs, a word meaning “winged lizard.”

18/ In Isaiah 14:29 and 30:6, the meaning of “fiery flying serpent” is clear. The Hebrew phrase includes a term derived from the verb uph, meaning to fly or flutter, moving back and forth like wings.

19/ The word saraph used in these verses can refer to fiery serpents, venomous serpents, shining serpents, flying dragons, and even certain angels. Isaiah distinguishes the fiery flying saraph from the angelic seraphs (seraphim) he saw standing near God’s throne.

20/ If paintings, carvings, and written descriptions carry meaning, then flying reptiles persisted through many centuries in many places around the world. They are shown in European castles, Native American pictographs, ancient books, weaponry, coins, and seals.

21/ What Was Ketos? This was originally written in Greek, and the word that the King James Version translates as “whale” was ketos. The problem is that Greek has other specific words that refer to whales, and ketos is not one of them.

22/ An ancient Greek version of the Old Testament likewise translated “great fish” from Jonah 1:17 with the phrase ketei megalo, meaning a huge ketos. In particular, it was a sea serpent with a dog-like head, apparently large enough to swallow a man whole.

23/ 13 ancient authors whose writings shared this word and its serpentine definition:

• Homer (9th–8th century BC)
• Euripides (ca. 480–406 BC)
• Aristophanes (448–380 BC)
• Lycophron (285–247 BC)
• Marcus Terentius Varro (116–27BC)
• Diodorus Siculus (ca. 60 BC–AD30)

24/ continued...
• Manilius (1st century AD)
• Pausanias (2nd century AD)
• Claudius Aelianus in his De Natura Animalium (ca. AD 175–235)
• Oppian of Apamea (ca. AD 200)
• Eustathius (ca. AD 300–377)
• Hesychius (5th century AD)
• Johannes Moschus (6th century AD)

25/ I hope this helps with the question of whether dinosaurs are fake or not. Post questions below.