Did dinosaurs ever really exist? - Answers to children

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roza

Sun, Oct 29 2006, 3:01 pm

Any ideas on what to tell children in response to 'Did dinosaurs ever really exist' question?

So far I heard the following answers:

-no, they did not exist
-don't know
-Hashem created their bones for some reason, so they were dead already
-they were before Mabul (taninim gedolim) and died in Mabul (could not fit in the Tevah)
-Lemech killed them with his bow
-Hashem created them and then He made them die because we don't need them anymore (imagine dinos running around now)

Any other ideas?

This thread is not about the existence of the dinos but WHAT to tell children. If you would like to discuss the topic of the existence of the dinos please do so in Intellectual forum.

Tefila

Sun, Oct 29 2006, 3:38 pm

There is a pshat somewhere that they did exist since there is nothing new under the face of the sun. Though how exactly they lived and for how long is Confused

cutiesmom

Sun, Oct 29 2006, 8:38 pm

Quote:

-they were before Mabul (taninim gedolim) and died in Mabul (could not fit in the Tevah)

I would go with this answer, but skip the they could not fit in the Tevah.

chavamom

Sun, Oct 29 2006, 9:44 pm

We were just discussing I.D. and this came up. My neighbor (a high school rebbe) mentions that it is the Seforno that claims that the age of the world is not 5767 years old, but 5767 + 4 previous 'epochs'.

Marion

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 1:24 am

I like the one that says before the mabul, and yes, skip the teva. For all we know they didn't HAVE to fit in the teva, because they were dead by then. Especially if you take the idea that we don't know how long a day in the eyes of Hashem is, so really, there's no "stira" (um, don't know how to translate that, sorry) between the scientists who say millions of years ago and the fact that the world is only 5767 years old.

aussiegal

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 2:48 am

Quote:

there's no "stira" (um, don't know how to translate that, sorry)

stira = contradiction!!!

I would also go with the before mabul answer. I actually remember learning that the reason dinasour bones seem to be so old is that the conditions of the flood caused the bones to 'age'.

shalhevet

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 2:58 am

I agree with Marion ( Very Happy

) and cutiesmom about skipping the teiva part. It was a big miracle that all those millions of sorts of animals and birds could fit into the teiva at all, so had Hashem wanted He wouldn't have had a problem fitting the dinosaurs in too.

sarahd

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 4:22 am

I would also choose the "before the mabul" answer. If the question comes up as to why davka dinosaurs didn't survive, there are two possible answers:

1) It says, "Ki hishchis kol basar es darko", which is explained to mean that people (and animls!) engaged in forbidden relationships, bestiality, etc. Animals who miscegenated were destroyed, and it could well be that dinosaurs were included in that category (especially if you look at the weird combinations of animal/bird that seem to appear among fossils.)

2) Every creature was created for a tachlis. Dinosaurs fulfilled their tachlis (whatever it was) before the mabul, so there was no reason for them to exist afterwards.

supermom

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 5:48 am

From what I heard something like chavamom said that the world was created once and the dinosaurs were from then. Then Hashem remade the whole world.

But then I heard another explainations that dinosaurs do exsist till today. After the mabul Hashem made all the animals shrink. All non kosher animals there was only two of each so they went on the taivah and the rest stayed down. Like for example turtles were considered dinosaurs. All those bones that the scientist found must be the remains of the animals that didn't come into the taivah, or for infact real dinosaurs that were not "zoche" to be one of the seven.

shabbatiscoming

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 8:28 am

if my child ever asked if dinosaurs ever existed, I would just tell them yes. why say anything else? so, it does not fit in exactly with the way that we know history, but they definintely existed. that is what my parents always told us.

supermom

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 9:09 am

supermom wrote:

From what I heard something like chavamom said that the world was created once and the dinosaurs were from then. Then Hashem remade the whole world.

Correction the world was made six times but Hashem didnt like it. On the seventh time he was pleased.

happy2beme

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 9:43 am

thx rosa for bringing this up

my dd asked me this a few times & I always said they existed before the mabul but just felt a little iffy on the subject- thanks for clearing it up!! Smile

busymom

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 2:48 pm

supermom wrote:

From what I heard something like chavamom said that the world was created once and the dinosaurs were from then. Then Hashem remade the whole world.

Correction the world was made six times but Hashem didnt like it. On the seventh time he was pleased.

but if those worlds were destroyed, why would these fossils remain?
that's why I'd also say they existed at some point, but prob not since the mabul.

chocolate moose

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 4:11 pm

Didn’t the Rebbe say that the world was created with a history?

JRKmommy

Mon, Oct 30 2006, 4:16 pm

Even secular sources will say that dinosaurs died off long before there were people on earth. So, since there were people at the time of the mabul, "before the mabul" would be a safe answer. You can add that this means that no one ever SAW a real dinosaurs - they just know about them from the fossils. Cartoons and so on are clearly fantasy.

supermom

Tue, Oct 31 2006, 4:58 am

SaraG wrote:

Didn’t the Rebbe say that the world was created with a history?

Could you explain?

Marion

Tue, Oct 31 2006, 5:25 am

mummyof6 wrote:

I agree with Marion ( Very Happy

I thought I was dreaming! Nearly choked on my water!

TzenaRena

Tue, Oct 31 2006, 6:16 am

supermom wrote:

SaraG wrote:

Didn’t the Rebbe say that the world was created with a history?

Could you explain?

Just as Adam and Chava were created as mature adults, they did not go through babyhood, childhood, youth and finally adulthood. At the moment of their creation, they were complete and mature.
Same thing with the chicken and the egg. The chicken came first. It didn't hatch and become a baby chick, it was created complete. The tree did not sprout, become a seedling, then a sapling, and finally etc. The earth was covered with mature trees with many branches, rings, thick trunks, and ripe fruit as soon as Hashem said "Let the earth give forth a covering of grass...., fruit trees that bear fruit that its seed is within it, to its kind...."

Similarly, the starlight from stars that are thousands of light years away was created already on its way, already shining their light upon earth

The strata of rocks, and "fossil" fuel within.. mountains and valleys, canyons and rockscapes, all were created without the need for millions of years of sandstorms, wind, and elements to carve them.

Hashem created the world in a complete state. It is just as simple for Him to do this as it is to create even one atom of the simplest element, or creature, which is also not within the ability of mankind to create, or possibility to evolve on its own, so there is no need to conjecture possibilities to satisfy the evolutionists,because even if there would have been a "Big Bang", that would have had to be designed by the Creator as well.

"The passuk doesn't come to obscure, but rather to meke it clear." so that when the passuk tells us the six days of Creation, it is clear that that's what it meant - and not some obscure interpretation that actually contradicts it's literal meaning - p'shuto shel mikra.

Last edited by TzenaRena on Tue, Oct 31 2006, 1:38 pm; edited 1 time in total

ChavieK

Tue, Oct 31 2006, 8:17 am

Sarayehudis that was a great explaination. That is what I had learned & always sat very well with me.I have also explaine it that way to my kids.Ir's easy to understand.

gryp

Tue, Oct 31 2006, 11:05 am

do you know there is a midrash in Parshas B'reishes that says that once people started going against Hashem in evil ways the "tzelem Elokim" left them and they looked like monkeys. Exclamation

(from the Klapholtz book)
that explains the monkey theory.
(sorry off topic)

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