All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died. And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark. (Genesis 7:22-23)
The fossil record consists of 95% marine creatures, around 4% plant fossils, and only about 1% land animals – dinosaurs, mammals, flying creatures, etc. In this last category of fossils, complete, intact fossils are even rarer. Most fossil remains are found disarticulated, broken, and scattered, testifying to the violent nature of their burial.
Yet, even within this small fragment of the fossil record, human fossils are, for all practical purposes, non-existent. The absence of human fossils frequently raises the question, “Why do we not see more human fossils?” The Bible clearly records that the Flood killed “All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land died” (Genesis 7:22). The fossil record confirms this fact, and according to the Bible record, only eight humans survived on the Ark that Noah built. Yet we find all kinds of animal fossils, but no humans. Given the 1600 years of earth history before the Flood, as recorded in the Bible, where human lifespan exceeded 900 years, earth’s population would have been in the billions. It stands to reason that we should have an abundance of human fossils, but they are as “scarce as hens’ teeth.”
In all the years I served in a creation ministry, I never received a satisfactory answer to the question. The general consensus holds that humans were washed out to “sea” during the flood, drowned and were scavenged so that nothing was left to fossilize. However, that does not really explain how that took place. Certainly, that could have happened to the dinosaurs, and yet we have an abundant, albeit rare, sampling of dinosaur fossils, but no humans.
Recently, I received a newsletter from David Rives Ministries, where Rives writes the most cogent and reasonable response to the question of the missing human fossils that I have heard to date. First, David suggests that humans “would have already been living in areas higher than pre-flood sea level … Then, you can bet when water began to rise, they would have climbed as high as they could… then they would have floated for as long as possible. They may have survived for a short while by grabbing floating logs and driftwood. But with all of the marine creatures swimming near the surface of the water to get away from the mud [generated by the flood waters], there would be some really large predator animals feeding on bodies. When humans couldn’t survive any longer, they would have died and floated on the water’s surface … a lot of them bloated when they died, floating on top of the water as they decayed. Their bones would have scattered as they sank to the bottom of the water … And because many of the bones that fell would have landed on top of most of the flood sediment, then fossilization wouldn’t have taken place. Fossilization requires burial.”[1]
Consider that the flood lasted 371 days. The hot “ocean” waters resulting from the rupture of the “fountains of the deep”[2] and the increased salinity from increased volcanic activity would have rendered the water undrinkable; so even if they managed to find boats, survival for that length of time would have been impossible. If that were not enough, predators in the water were not included in “every living substance [that] was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground.”
Rives makes another good point for the absence of human fossils. He writes, “To make the problem of finding human remains even worse, it appears that a lot of the last layers of the flood to be deposited—the top layers of mud—the ones with the majority of human skeletons—were washed into the ocean basins as the floodwaters began to recede. In other words, fast-moving water swept the very top layers of sediment off to the lowest areas as the water drained, taking much of the human remains with it.”[3] As with dinosaur fossils, human remains would have been ripped apart by the receding waters scattering individual bones over large areas.
Possibly, someone may discover fossilized human bones, and perhaps some have already been found. However, it is very unlikely that a complete fossilized human fossil will ever be found, the lesson we can learn from this is that God’s wrath against sin is not something with which to trifle.
Notes:
[1] David Rives, “I Believe In the Flood… But Why No Human Fossils?” Creation Club Magazine, March-April 2020, pp. 12-13.”
[3] David Rives, p. 13.
Ernie's Musings 