Before reading this article, please read the articles, “The Chiastic Structure of Genesis 1-11” and “The Two Beasts of Revelation 13 in Genesis 1-3!“
Before we get started, let’s ask the question, why should we look for an answer to what happened before Genesis 1:1? Why is that important – especially biblically speaking?
Sometimes what we’re NOT told in the bible is just as important as what we’re told. Why didn’t the bible see fit to include how it was that the world ended up in a state of complete chaos? Why only tell us about the aftermath, and God’s covenant with Adam and Eve and their family line?
The answer, believe it or not, is that what happened before, was actually fairly well-known in the time of Adam. Not only did the bible not need to include those details because they would be repetitive, but it was attempting to show that man could have a different fate and a better path than the one which had resulted in the complete destruction that Genesis 1:1 starts with.
We’ve mostly lost that knowledge since the time of Adam. And unfortunately, we may end up repeating the events that caused that great catastrophe. That’s why it’s so important to understand. The bible leaves scattered hints about this time period before Genesis 1:1, and the repeating pattern established from Gen. 1:1-6:9 and Gen. 6:10-11:10 is one of them. There are more hints – hints I’ll get to later in this article – but if we want to get the full story, we’ll have to look elsewhere.
With this repeating pattern that we have in Genesis, we have a fairly good idea of what pattern of events that we’re looking for, which would have happened before that time:
- God covenants with man, but sin and murder enter
- An evil generation where violence fills the earth (as in the time of Noah)
- An epic catastrophe leading to a state of complete chaos, setting the stage for Genesis 1:1
Unfortunately, the time period we want to investigate has no historical records whatsoever. Archaeologically speaking, we would only be able to make a few tentative suppositions on what might have happened. The most important part of the pattern – God covenanting with man – is something the archaeological record alone, simply could not tell us.
That means we’re stuck looking at ancient legends and oral traditions handed down over many generations. That’s not exactly the most reliable source of information! On the other hand, an epic catastrophe which destroyed an ancient people who were once holy, would likely stick out as very memorable in the legends of the survivors.
Two more important points, before we get started. First, the ancient pagan creation literature that we’ve studied and compared to the biblical Creation account, hides allusions to the time period we want to investigate. Instead of explaining it outright, the pagan creation literature instead finds ways to make the knowledge of this time period relevant to the various peoples who are preserving it. One of the ways that it hides these things is through astronomical symbolism – the same sort of symbolism that we’ve already discovered in Genesis 1-3 and elsewhere in the bible!
Secondly, as this ancient, pagan creation literature gradually fell out of favor, more blatant references to the time period we want to investigate, begin to appear. So paradoxically, we’ll find out more by looking at later periods of history first, than we will by looking at more ancient periods of history that are contemporary to the time of Adam and Eve.
Perhaps the most famous legend of all, in terms of a civilization that was once holy and became corrupted, which was then destroyed, is the myth of ATLANTIS. Is this the civilization we’re looking for – the one that fits the pattern we found, established in Genesis?
The myth of Atlantis was preserved from a fairly late period of history. The first reference to Atlantis was in the dialogues of Plato – the Timaeus and the Critias – dating to roughly 360 BC. It goes something like this:
Atlantis was an island empire with tremendous wealth that they gained through trading overseas with other peoples – colonies that they themselves had established. The inhabitants were once holy and ethical, but over time they became corrupted because of their great wealth. They went to war with their own colonies to gain even more wealth, but in the midst of that terrible war, the island of Atlantis sunk into the ocean in a single day and night. The survivors were scattered all over the world, bringing tales of the doomed empire of Atlantis, and a warning to keep the ethical laws that Atlantis had abandoned, to their own destruction.
We can dig into the details of this legend further, but these are the basics. Here’s the all-important question, though. Does this legend fit in the context of the pattern we’re looking for? In addition, does the time period of Atlantis and its destruction, make sense in terms of what the bible tells us about Creation?
Let’s look at the first point. Did God covenant with man, in ancient Atlantis? And, did sin and murder enter in, in any significant way, before the great and terrible war at their end?
None of the legends about Atlantis give any mention of God. Instead, there’s a temple built for the worship of Poseidon, the original ruler of Atlantis, in the center of the island, on top of a mountain. The inhabitants worshipped Poseidon as a god.
However, we do see evidence of an ancient murder. Creation myths associated with Egypt, found on the walls of the temple at Edfu, hint that the Egyptians themselves originally came from an “Island of the Egg” in the middle of the ocean, which sank and left behind only reeds. Egyptian myths describe the murder of the god Horus by his brother Set.
What about the second point – an evil generation where violence fills the earth? According to the legend, the gods divided rulership over the world by lot, and Poseidon’s lot fell on the island of Atlantis. (Sound familiar? Compare Deuteronomy 32:8-9.) Poseidon had ten sons – five sets of twins – and divided up his island empire among them. For a long period of time, they ruled in harmony with one another, obeying the laws of Poseidon, which were inscribed on a metal pillar in the island’s temple. This period of harmony continued for many generations, as the ruling kings venerated their ancestors in the temple. But eventually, greed overcame them, and they went to war with the colonies that they had established, the leading colony of which was the city of Athens. (Not the city which was built circa 3,000 BC, but an earlier city which existed thousands of years before that.)
And the third point? What catastrophe befell Atlantis? According to the legend, the entire island – an island that was reportedly about 435 miles across – sunk in a day and a night, leaving behind mostly impassable reeds where land once was, and only the “bones” of the original landmass (bits and pieces of land that still stuck out of the water).
As far as the time setting of Atlantis and its destruction, Plato related that the brother of his ancestor Dropides, named Solon, had once visited the district of Sais in Egypt, in circa 600 BC. The Egyptian priests there explained the legend of Atlantis to him, and told him that these events had taken place nine thousand years before then – in 9,600 BC.
Where was Atlantis, according to the legends? Plato related that Atlantis was 40 days’ sail beyond the pillars of Hercules, at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea, into the Atlantic Ocean.
Does an ancient civilization that was destroyed in roughly 9,600 BC even make sense, as a pattern of history that was later repeated in Scripture? Well, let’s look at those hints that I mentioned earlier.
First, flip over to Ezekiel 27 and read the description of the merchant city of Tyrus. Does that sound at all like Atlantis, in that it’s a seafaring city which is renowned for its mercantile trade? Now, flip back to Ezekiel 26 and read through to verse 19. Notice how Tyrus’ fate was to sink into the sea?
Except historically, that didn’t happen. The city of Tyre was captured by Nebuchadnezzar and put to tribute, and Ezekiel himself even refers to this in Ezekiel 29:18. So either Ezekiel was a very bad editor and didn’t “fix” his prophecy against Tyrus when things didn’t work out that way…or he deliberately wrote it that way for a reason.
Now, flip over to Ezekiel 28 and read the description of the prince of Tyrus, followed by the “king” of Tyrus. Notice anything unusual?
Poseidon claimed to be a god, ruling over the island empire of Atlantis. In Ezekiel 28:2, the prince of Tyrus is accused of claiming to be a god, ruling over Tyrus “in the midst of the seas.” Through his great mercantile acumen, he had massively increased the wealth of his city.
Now look at the description of the “king” of Tyrus. Notice that he’s said to have been IN EDEN, the Garden of God. Except this doesn’t appear to be the Eden of Genesis 1-3, because Tyrus is said to be “in the midst of the seas.” Moreover, the “king” of Tyrus walked amidst “stones of fire” – apparently volcanic rocks – in THIS Eden.
Note that the Sargasso Sea – an area of impassable reeds surrounding the island of Bermuda – is roughly 40 days’ sail into the Atlantic Ocean, past the pillars of Hercules. Bermuda itself is an ancient, extinct volcano.
Do we have any other evidence that links Atlantis, as an island empire off the east coast of America, to the Creation account? We actually do…and it even includes a rough timespan since Atlantis was destroyed!
Note that in 2 Peter 3:8, Peter explains that a day to the Lord is like a thousand years to man, and vice-versa, quoting Psalm 90:4. What if we assign thousand-year periods of time to the “days” of Genesis 1?
| Day 6 | 5,000 – 4,000 BC | Man is created at the end of the sixth day |
| Day 5 | 6,000 – 5,000 BC | Great sea creatures (nations) created |
| Day 4 | 7,000 – 6,000 BC | Heavenly lights established for signs |
| Day 3 | 8,000 – 7,000 BC | Dry land appears |
| Day 2 | 9,000 – 8,000 BC | Firmament established to divide heavenly waters from earthly waters |
| Day 1 | 10,000 – 9,000 BC | Light appears out of darkness |
Amazingly enough, because of a massive cometary impact in 10,800 BC followed by a secondary impact in 9,600 BC, there was a long period of darkness where the light of the sun was greatly obscured. After 9,600 BC, the darkness began to clear so that the light of the sun was more visible once more.
Is there any evidence which links Atlantis – as an island in the Atlantic Ocean – to this original “Eden”? Yes we do…from the constellations associated with the “great sea creatures.” Recall that Capricornus represented Greece, etc. But we have more constellations that haven’t been mentioned or assigned yet.
Here’s the full list:
| Capricornus, the Horned Goat | Eastern Greece (Syria) |
| Delphinus, the Dolphin | Western Greece |
| Piscis Austrinus, the Southern Fish | “Upper” (Southern) Egypt |
| Cetus, the Whale | Assyria (originally Dilmun) |
| Pisces, the twin fishes | Babylon (originally Sumer) |
| Eridanus, the River | Indus Valley |
| Argo, the Ship | Indonesia |
| Hydra, the seven-headed sea serpent | America (Atlantis) |
As you can see, these constellations are generally ordered right to left, whereas the corresponding countries line up left to right, in reverse order. At the very least, Hydra would have to correspond to a nation east of the Indus Valley, but west of Greece. America not only fits the bill, but the secondary comet impact in 9,600 BC left behind two massive craters very close to Bermuda.
Admittedly, this is a lot of conjecture to connect a repeating pattern of history with the legend of an island empire off the coast of America. Even so, it’s clear from the repeating pattern in Genesis 1-11 that there must be another “repeat” before the time of Adam. The legend of Atlantis is the only thing that fits the bill.
Next, we’ll go into more detail on the great cataclysm that destroyed Atlantis, the biblical Flood of Noah, and a very interesting pattern of destruction from heaven in Revelation 8:7-13.
References:
Collins, Andrew. Gateway to Atlantis
Reymond, E. A. E. Mythical Origins of the Egyptian Temple
White, Gavin. Babylonian Star Lore