The 7 day week proves that there is a God.
I'm currently leading a study on 'Dr.' Luke and tomorrow we are going to discuss Luke 6 & 14 about the Sabbath, 4th commandment vs Mark 2:27, sabboth vs Sunday, and also how Sunday came about.
During my study, I was curious as to what science says is the origin of our standard '7 day week'? So I did a Google search and there is no valid explanation outside of the 7 days of creation. God instituted the 7 day week.
Mankind can explain the 24 hr. day - the rotation of the earth
35 comments
Well here's one good theory:
The seven-day week may have been chosen because its length approximates one moon phase (one quarter = 29.53 / 4 = 7.3825).
http://www.webexhibits.org/calendars/week.html
I found that in about 15 seconds on Google.
"All early cultures were exposed to the night sky. The seven celestial objects that are visible to the naked eye and moved in a way that clearly indicated they were not stars were hence known as "planets," or "wandering stars," in the ancient world, and they worked their way into the myths and legends of most early cultures. Time was and still is easily measured by celestial events; the spring equinox for example, occurs approximately every 365 days. It was easy to adapt the other 7 objects clearly seen floating about in the sky to measure the passage of time. The Sun, Moon and five visible planets gave their names to the weekly cycle of days."
This pattern lent itself to early religious teachings (Greek mythology for example) for most all knowledgeastronomy, reading and writing, and most forms of educationcame from religious centers. Two in particularastronomy and religionoften went hand in hand.
Learn something, you tool
It's quarter of a lunar month (approximately) and used to be marked as "first quarter" (a half moon), "second quarter" (full moon), "third quarter" (other half moon) and "new moon" (guess). Because the lunar month is not exactly divisible by 4 however, a more regular "civil week" was eventually adopted and weeks no longer tracked the phase of the moon.
The Babylonians and early Persians used lunar weeks of a variable number of days, some seven some eight to keep the lunar weeks in step with the phases of the moon. Hence the Roman calendar had eight day weeks (nundinae), and the Jewish calendar seven day ones, because when they "standardised" their weeks from the more ancient lunar one they each did so on a different one of the possible week lengths. The ancient Greeks had no "week" in their calendar at all, but then they were notably resistant to Persian ideas .
Once the week was fixed, and hence divorced from its lunar origins, a new mythology to justify it arose, and it is that mythology that you are still using to justify it 3 thousand years later.
He would probably have a better case if he reversed it:
Perfect divine 24h day
errrm... the 7 day week is the invention of a Christian, the very same person who invented (gasp!) the Gregorian calendar, back in the early days of Christianity. There have been other measurements of time in history, like the Mayan and Aztec calendars, not to mention the very briefly used calendar that was invented during the French Revolution.
Also, thee is a massive logical disconnect between the idea that the earth was created in 7 days, and how we measure time. I fail to see the connection.
Please go down to the local supermarket and by a brain that is at least the size of chicken's.
Yeah, and that explains why you've got Tur's Day, Woden's Day, Thor's Day, Freya's Day, etc etc
Consider the following, please.
The word "month" comes from the ancestor of the word "moon", which makes sense because the moon goes all the way through its phases over the course of roughly one month, coming back to where it started in 28 days.
Major phases of the moon occur 4 times during this 28-day period.
28/4=7
Lunar cycles can explain the 7 day week measure of time.
My French history is a bit week, but didn't Napoleon or the French Revolutionists once try to introduce a 10 day week, but it somehow didn't work and got dropped. Not sure that this is really relevent, but it is interesting how ingrained in human beings the 7 day week is - not that I'm saying it's God or anything.
How about the facts that:
1. 7 days are one-quarter of a lunar cycle of 28 days.
2. The seven-day week originated in Jewish society. The Christians picked it up, and wouldn't you know, when the Roman Empire became officially Christian, it spread throughout Europe.
3. European society created colonies in every inhabitable area they could find, and imposed their culture, including the 7-day week, on all of these colonies.
I believe the Ancient Egyptians had a 10 day week.
The seven day week proves that man figured out the earth's rotation and used it to his advantage to devise a system of timekeeping so efficient it's remained unchanged for centuries.
And if the 7 day week was God's creation, then why do the day's names have pagan roots?
So, God created time so imperfectly that we need a leap-year every four years?
This argument is as weak as the "then why are there so many churchs?". They actually believe that's valid too.
by the way, Google search '7 day week'. First result Wikapedia says it's babylonian in origion, based on moon patterns, the Jews adopted it from the Babylonians.
So, by your logic it's the pantheon of Babylonian Gods that you've proven.
How is it you didn't get that in your search?
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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