In order to understand the significance for biblical creationism of the theory of Pangea, we must look ahead to the story of the flood. The Flood narrative is found in Genesis 7. In that story, the word for mountain or hill (har) is used for the first time in the Bible. When we consider the nature of Pangea, the super-continent, what is most apparent is the lack of any plate tectonic action. Only when the massive continent of Pangea began separating into what we know now as the continents and islands of earth did plate tectonics play a role.
Plate tectonics is the movement of the various plates of the earth’s crust. The San Andreas Fault in California is one example of the results of the movement of the earth’s plates. Volcanoes and earthquakes result when the plates move against one another. Also, all the mountains of the earth are the result of the movement of the earth’s plates. On Pangea, before the appearance of the vast continents of the earth, mountains, as we know them now, did not exist. Probably, high hills existed, but surely not mountains.
The climate of Pangea, using the biblical model as an explanation, would have been exceedingly humid. A look at fossil’s found in Antarctica illustrates well that fact. Alfred Wegener, who introduced the idea of Pangea, found the same rock formations and fossils in Africa, South America, and Antarctica. Some of the fossils were of species that grew in only one type of climate, yet the fossils were found on continents now having differing climates. Included in these fossil finds were flowering trees, much like those found in tropical environments today, and dinosaurs. How could there be fossils of tropical climate species in Antarctica, a continent now permanently covered with ice and snow?
The original makeup of earth then was, without doubt, a single, large, tropical super-continent. Such an environment would have been ideal for the great dinosaurs. Genesis 1 suggests the original plants were grasses, reeds and small bushes and trees of the kinds now existing in tropical forests. During the era of Pangea, the earth was enveloped by a dense cloud cover (Gen. 17). Genesis 2.5 states, “and all bushes of the pasture lands were not yet in the earth, and all grasses of the pasture lands were not yet in the earth, because the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth; but a mist rose up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the land.” (Gen. 2.5-6)
Let’s compare Genesis 1.11-12 and 2.5-6 because of the seeming conflict between these two texts regarding the description of the earth. In 1.11-12, the text tells us of the earth’s sprouting three kinds of plants: green grass, seed producing plants and fruit trees. The plants described in 2.5 are of a different sort. In that verse, pasture grasses and pasture bushes are described. Now, the plants described in 1.11-12 could easily be understood as plants native to a tropical environment. If Pangaea was primarily tropical, pasture lands, commonly referred to as savannahs, would not yet have developed. Further, the description of the climate in 2.6 is consistent with a heavily tropical environment. So, we can say Gen. 1.11-12 describes one kind of environment and 2.5-6 another.
Interestingly, recent discoveries in South China show animal life (as evolutionists understand the development of animal life) sprang from lakes and not the ocean, virtually setting evolutionary theory on its head (http://www.livescience.com/animals/090727-first-life.html). The biblical description of the beginnings of life on earth, consistent with the finds in China, tell of life sprouting and being created in a marshy, watery tropical environment. In that rainforest world, with its lush, abundant vegetation, a variety of animal life forms existed. Among those were dinosaurs. Unfortunately, the Bible gives no description of the kinds of animals God created first (Gen. 1.20-25). All we can learn from the biblical account is “God made the living creatures of the earth according to their species, beasts and animals creeping on the earth according to their species.”
From the beginning, life on earth has been diverse. Yet, when plants sprouted from the earth, they did so according to their species; when birds, fish and sea monsters (whales, dolphins, etc.) were created, they, too, were according to their species; when animal life was created, they as well were brought forth according to their species. No species of plant or animal life developed from another species. Each life form was made by God according to his plan. Each life form is a part of a specific family or species; each has a particular context in which it lives best.
In our next post, we will look further at life forms as described in Genesis.
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