by Gary Bates
Quite simply, the straightforward reading of the Bible is as follows. Genesis 1:1 says: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Although this opening passage of the Bible describes the creation of the entire universe, it specifically mentions the earth, and only later the sun and moon in our solar system. Stars are mentioned later on in the text, almost as an aside, and the context makes it clear that they were made specifically to benefit mankind, thus placing man as the focus of God’s creation. There is never a single case where a verse refers or alludes to any other reason for the creation of stars, such as for the purpose of harboring extraterrestrial life.
The whole of God’s creation was “very good,” as God pronounced it on day 6. God could hardly have called the process of evolution, with its death and struggle and survival of the fittest, “good,” so the texts imply that there was no death before Adam and Eve. When mankind sinned or rebelled against God, the “curse” was brought upon all of God’s creation, not just mankind. God cursed the earth (Gen. 3:17), the plants (vs. 18), and the animals (vs. 14); and in fact, Romans 8:21–22 says that the entire creation suffers from the Curse:
… the creation itself [has not yet been] set free from its bondage to decay… . We know that the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now (Revised Standard Version).
The whole of creation (the universe) was subject to decay as a result of the Curse. This would mean that any inhabitants on other planets, initially created good by God, would now be subject to the curse of death and corruption, suffering, etc. as a result of Adam’s sin on Earth. That would hardly seem fair to aliens innocent of any connection with the sin of Adam, and with no genetic connection to him either. One attempt to fit ETs into the Bible is on the basis of a word in Hebrews 11:3 where it says:
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
The word “worlds” appears in the KJV translation and some others, and some claim that it refers to other inhabitable planets. However, the word is αιών (aiōn), from which we derive the word “eon.” Thus modern translations render the word as “universe” (entire space-time continuum) because it correctly describes “everything that exists in time and space, visible and invisible, present and eternal.” This is also the case when we read expressions like “The heavens and earth; the creation” and so on. Even if it were referring to other planets, it is an unwarranted extrapolation to presume intelligent life on them.
When God, in the form of Jesus Christ (the second person of the Trinity), stepped out of heaven, He came to the earth (this planet only) as a human being, not a Pleiadian or a Vulcan, and He came not only to redeem mankind (who are descendants of Adam) back to Himself, but His creation also (Romans 8:21, Colossians 1:20). The Bible also calls Christ “The last Adam” (1Corinthians 15:22,45) because there was a real historical first Adam. God says He will ultimately destroy this cursed creation and restore (or return) it back to the way it was in the beginning. He is going to create a new heaven and a new Earth, not just a new Earth. The fact that God is going to make a new creation indicates clearly that the whole of this present creation is cursed and that there are no unfallen parts of this universe. If there is intelligent alien life, not only have they been subjected to the curse of death through no fault of their own but they would also have no chance of redemption through Christ. That momentous event took place on Earth for the human race only (Heb. 9:26–28). And ultimately aliens and their world would be destroyed at the end, through no fault of their own. The Scriptures are very clear that Christ did not, and will not, be visiting other planets to undergo crucifixion for alien races.
1 Peter 3:18 says:
For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.
He died once. That’s it. And other parts of Scripture makes it clear that the “all” refers clearly to Adam’s fallen race, not “all the inhabitants of all planets.” Isaiah 59:20 speaks of this coming Messiah as literally the “Kinsman-Redeemer,” i.e. one who isrelated by bloodto those he redeems. It uses the same Hebrew word גואל (gôēl) used to describe Boaz in relation to Ruth. Any Vulcanians would not be related to Jesus by blood, so not only would they have suffered for no reason as their part of the universe was cursed, then later destroyed, but as indicated, they have no way of sharing in the redemption of the whole universe brought about by Christ’s sacrifice. Not only is it clear that even the new creation will be designed for mankind, but the idea of Christ separately visiting the planet Vulcan to redeem aliens living there falls down for another reason. In the new creation, ruled by Christ, redeemed humanity is going to live as Christ’s “bride” throughout eternity (Eph. 5:22–33; Rev. 19:7–9). Marriage is defined in Genesis as monogamous—one man for one woman, and the marriage of Christ and His bride, the church, born from the spear wound in His side, is a clear parallel to the first man and his bride, born from a wound in the side of Adam. In other words, Christ will not be a bigamist or polygamist. He will have one bride in eternity, not two (an earthly and a Vulcanian one). The Bible makes no provision for God to redeem any other species, any more than to redeem fallen angels (Heb. 2:16). Mankind and the earth are clearly the spiritual center of God’s universe. When we consider the uniqueness of what God has done for us, it makes His redemptive work all the more wonderful.
A novel approach
A more recent idea to allow for ETs arose out of a perceived need to protect Christianity in the event of a real alien visitation to Earth. Michael S. Heiser is an influential Christian UFOlogist/speaker whose site states that he has an M.A. and Ph.D. in Hebrew Bible and Ancient Semitic Languages. He claims that the arguments put forward earlier might not apply to God-created aliens. Because they are not descendants of Adam they have not inherited his sin nature, and thus, are not morally guilty before God. Just like “bunny rabbits” on the earth, they do not need salvation — even though they will die, they are going to neither heaven nor hell.
On the surface this seems a compelling argument; after all, fallen angels are intelligent but are beyond salvation (Hebrews 2:16). However, angels are immortal and not of our corporeal dimension. And Heiser’s ETs in spaceships require a level of intelligence not found in rabbits. This acutely highlights the injustice of their suffering the effects of the Curse, including death and ultimately extinction when the heavens are “rolled up like a scroll” (Revelation 6:14). It would be incongruous to assign this sort of moral culpability (“unfairness” if you like) to a righteous God. Indeed, some already given over to the inevitability of intelligent life elsewhere, use this argument to deny the existence of God. Of course it is their own starting assumptions that are faulty, by believing in unseen and unproven ETs. It also seems bizarre to claim that highly intelligent beings bear no moral responsibility for their actions.
Heiser also claims that vastly intelligent ETs would not displace mankind’s position as being made in the image of God because “image” just means humans have been placed as God’s representatives on the earth.
However, the Bible says we are made in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:26), which also assigns God’s moral attributes onto us as the ultimate law giver (rightly so if He created everything). Man was instantly created a fully intelligent being about 6,000 years ago and was involved in craftsmanship shortly thereafter (Genesis 4:22). Since that time, even we have not been able to develop technologies advanced enough to travel to other star systems. If aliens were capable of developing incredible faster-than-light spaceships needed to get here, one would presume they must have been created with vastly superior intellects to ours — which would make them even more in God’s likeness in that sense than we are. Or, their creation is much older than the 6,000 years of the biblical six-day timeframe; the aliens were created before man and had sufficient time to develop their technologies. However, God created Earth on Day 1 and later the heave
nly bodies on Day 4.
Influenced from outside the Bible
Although Heiser does not promote theistic evolution, he is sympathetic to a universe billions of years old. Although he claims to hold a high view of Scripture he has publicly stated that because he knows many fine Christian men who believe in evolution and an old Earth and universe, that he is still unsure in this area. From this one could gain the impression that his view of Scripture might not be as high as he claims, if he places man’s potentially fallible assumptions about past events (which we cannot test or prove — see chapter 3) in authority over a plain reading of the Genesis text as straightforward history, just as it was taken by Jesus Himself and the NT writers.
In theory, a billions-of-years-old universe could allow the time necessary for any unseen ETs to develop the almost science-fiction-like technologies required to get here.
There is a huge theological problem for the gospel in these long ages. First, it is important to understand that the whole idea of long ages was derived from the belief that sedimentary rock layers on Earth represent eons of time, and not radiometric dating or even the belief that distant starlight is millions of light years away (meaning the universe must be at least that old). This in turn was derived from the dogmatic assumption that there were no special acts of creation or a global Flood as recorded in Scripture, so that Earth’s features must be explained by processes seen to be happening now. This philosophy of uniformitarianism seems to amply fulfil the Apostle Peter’s prophecy recorded in 2Peter 3:3–7.
First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
The conflict with the gospel is that these very same rock layers contain fossils — a record of dead things showing evidence of violence, disease and suffering. Thus, taking a millions-of-years view, even without evolution, places death and suffering long before the Fall of Adam. This undermines the gospel and the very reasons that Christ came to the earth — such as reversing the effects of the Curse brought in by Adam (and Eve), and restoring all things to a sinless, deathless condition.
Ranking the created order
Psalm 8:5 says that man was made a little lower than the angels and crowned with glory and honour. Heiser has said that salvation is based upon ranking, not intelligence. If so, where would ETs sit in this pecking order (which fails to mention them)? Would they be higher than man, and lower than angels, for example? If these advanced ETs were capable of visiting the earth, mankind would now be subject to their dominion. (Even if the ETs were friendly, potentially they would be much more powerful due to their intelligence and superior technology.) This would be in direct contravention to God’s ordained authority structure when he ordered mankind to “subdue” the earth — also known as the dominion mandate (Genesis 1:28).
It might be the case that we could find “microbes on Mars” for example. It is of course possible that mankind has contaminated other planets with “bugs” from the earth anyway. But in any case, finding such life would not invalidate the gospel. So what about a more intelligent creature such as a dolphin swimming around in a sea on some distant moon? Once again, this would not invalidate the gospel, because although such creatures might be self-aware to an extent, and intelligent, they cannot make moral decisions and thus do not need redemption. It is unlikely that we will ever be faced with this “problem” as its likelihood seems inconsistent with the focus of God’s creation being mankind. The myriad of life contained in the whole biosphere of Earth is interdependent on each other. Such an interdependent system is an incredible testament to the infinitely wise designer who made it. And he placed mankind at the head of that biosphere. In short, the earth, with its plants and animals, is an important life support system for humanity, so evidence of any part of such a biosphere elsewhere, though it would not invalidate the gospel, would be most peculiar, to put it mildly. But an intelligent race with a civilization capable of building advanced craft would,
I believe, be in direct contradiction to the “big picture” of the gospel found in God’s Word.
Did Ezekiel see a UFO?
One of the most infamous claims about UFOs appearing in the Bible is the “sighting” by Ezekiel in Ezekiel 1:1–28. Erich von Däniken is just one of many leading writers who claim that the prophet Ezekiel saw a spaceship.
In the case of the mighty prophet Ezekiel, he was given an amazing experience, and a picture of something that no other person had seen. The text clearly describes the events that took place, and Ezekiel says his vision was imparted to him by God (Ezek. 1:1, 3).
A prophet is a specially chosen person. He is a spokesman for God, and God communicates with his chosen person in such a style that the prophet knows for sure he is hearing only from God. “Knowing the voice of God” is one of the reasons that the biblical prophets were always 100 percent accurate, unlike modern “prophets,” whether in the Christian church or outside of it. Ezekiel had a similar problem with a proliferation of false prophets in his day. Ezekiel 13 records that he was told to prophesy against the false prophets of his day. People did not always like God’s true prophets because they often spoke directly and personally about people’s lives, particularly in the area of revealing and condemning their sin. Often the hearers would reject God’s warnings via His prophets because they wanted to continue in their own way.
In Ezekiel’s case, God used dramatic imagery to get His message across. For example, in chapter 37, Ezekiel was given a vision of a valley of dry bones. Step by step, sinew and flesh attached to these bones until they came to life as a vast army. Was it meant to be taken literally? Not in this case, because God told Ezekiel that the story was symbolic of Israel’s restoration to their homeland (they were in exile at the time).
The so-called UFO that Ezekiel saw was no different. No one saw it except Ezekiel. He describes wheels, wings, and living creatures that looked like burning coals and moved like flashes of lightning. Above this strange contraption were a throne and a figure that looked like a man with a brilliant light surrounding him. But right at the very beginning of the passage (vs. 1) and at the end (vs. 28), Ezekiel unmistakably pronounces that it is a vision of God. In verse 17, the “vehicle” is described as going in all directions at the same time, which a real vehicle cannot do. This description is a reference to the fact that God is everywhere at the same time (omnipresent) and that He is not constrained to our understanding. The vision of a man was probably that of the preincarnate Christ, or God the Father in all His glory being carried along by four cherubim (angels).
Many UFO believers claim they place great store in the biblical texts but only when it suits their purposes to do so. It is incredible how often people take a passage of Scripture completely out of context to prove a pet theory. Masquerading angels have also concocted a pseudo-philosophy to closely parallel the texts for their own evil aims. The Bible has become “fair game” for those with their own agenda. I recall an investigator at a UFO meeting glowingly using the passage in Ezekiel to say that “even the Bible mentions UFOs.” When I challenged his comment, pointing out that nowhere does Ezekiel use the term “ship,” “craft,” or any other word to describe a vehicle of any sort, and when I made the more important point that the text clearly describes the thing as a vision from God, he replied, “Yeah, but it’s still a UFO.”
I didn’t say what he wanted to hear. He had already made his mind up and brought his outside ideas to the Bible. He wanted to believe that it was a UFO, despite the intent of the author and the actual words written. This
misreading of the Bible is sadly common in UFOlogy.
Who were the “sons of God” in Genesis 6?
Probably the most often-used and controversial passage of Scripture by pro-ETH UFOlogists is the account of “the sons of God” and their resultant offspring, the Nephilim. The description in Genesis 6:1–7 reads:
When men began to multiply on the face of the ground, and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were fair; and they took to wife such of them as they chose. Then the Lord said, “My spirit shall not abide in man for ever, for he is flesh, but his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown. The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the ground, man and beast and creeping things and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them” (Revised Standard Version).