How did life begin?
Evolution? Creation? Or something else?
Where did man come from?

Created?

Of course! But how?

Was creation an instant spark from GOD? Or through evolution as preferred by certain branches of science? Perhaps a combination of the two? Or maybe some completely different means we know not of?

Was the world, or mankind, created only 5,000 or 6,000 years ago? I have heard this theory of Divine creation, complete with ancient fossil records which were placed there to test us. My problem with this is “Why?” If a reasonable definition of that word “test” is forthcoming, they why put a limit of 5,000 or 6,000 years? Why not say that creation took place 15 minutes ago and our memories and documents of civilization were placed there to “test” us? And to test us for what?? . . . faith in a Divine lie?

Needless to say, that is one creation theory I have problems with. Our minds contain a marvelous tool called LOGIC and was placed there for a reason by whatever means was required to accomplish that feat.

I am open to any reasonable explanation regarding the Origin of Man. The creation stories as told by myths and Sacred Writings from all over the world list creation in outline form, or by allegorical tales. Somewhere amidst all of these stories is an elusive thread of truth. Finding that thread is a lifetime job for someone so dedicated.

I am not that person. I use logic and a willingness to say “I don’t know!, but I do want to know”.

Reading the various creation stories, applying logic, and using intuition, I feel I have a workable outline of the past many billions of years.

There has always been life, the life of GOD. It fills the Universe. GOD is Spirit and the physical world is a Spiritual Manifestation. Explanation of this may be found in my other writings.

At some point in the far distant past in my opinion, spiritual beings formed a type of laboratory which spanned the gulf between the physical and the spiritual realms. In that laboratory, experiments were carried out with various types of life forms that could exist in one, the other, or in both the physical and spiritual realms. What forms existed in the past are speculative, but what was suitable is still here somewhere in our physical universe.

This universe is vast. There are many, very many places where the life forms were put down, were started. It would seem reasonable to assume there were many failures, many successes, and many in-between types.

The universe is believed by astronomers to be about 13.7 billion years old, give or take a few eons of time. Life that was established in the universe would have evolved exceedingly in the huge amount of time that has passed since then.

Our own earth is about 4.5 billion years old - about 1/3 the age of the universe. Life on this planet goes back to very close to the beginning time of the earth. Very simple one-celled creatures (plants? animals?) were there and lasted for a vast amount of time before they became simple multi-celled creatures.

Then came the explosions of life of great complexity. The pre-Cambrian explosion produced all of life’s 26 phyla almost “overnight”. Evolutionists cannot explain this. No new phylum has appeared since then. Creationists dance with glee at this ‘proof’ of “creation” (at least those who don’t accept the 4004 BC myth). How can this be logically explained?

The life that is elsewhere in the universe will have developed on its own. If it developed on lines similar to earthly development, and having had a head start, then intelligent and civilized life would have come about many billions of years before our own civilization even learned to write. We are now on the verge of space exploration/travel. How far into space exploration/travel have these vastly older civilizations come?

Did these space-faring races “seed” Earth with life? Did this become interpreted as “creation”?

Evolution does take place, but not at the rate of life “explosions”. Will life spontaneously begin with things such as Prokaryotes and Eukaryotes? Even though these are considered simple one cell life forms, they are amazingly complex. Prokaryotes existed at a time when the earth was hot and still cooling off from its birth period. It was 1/2 billion years from the beginning of the earth before the ‘lowly’ Prokaryote appeared, and another two billion years before the multi-cell Eukaryote came into being. Another 1 1/2 billion years and the pre-Cambrian explosion . . .

Add still more time - 1/2 billion years and we are where we are now.

Has our world been influenced by interstellar travelers?
Has mankind been altered into the being he now is by the aforementioned visitors?
Did man come from a “monkey” (or more likely, a hominid)?
Was man genetically altered? Who? How? Why?

What is a workable description of GOD?
How does that description of GOD fit into this picture?
Just what did GOD do? . . . Is He doing?
Did GOD do instantaneous creation?
Or did GOD “control” evolution?
Did GOD have the assistance of space visitors?

I feel so ignorant.