The dinosaur question has plagued for a long time the minds of the writers of the Watchtower. Of course, if you are a believer in evolution the answer is easy, dinosaurs evolved over millions of years and went extinct when an asteroid hit the earth sone time ago.But for a creationist and a Bible believer dinosaurs rise many interesting questions:Why did God create them? Why did God create carnivore dinosaurs? Why did the dinosaurs go extinct? Can we find dinosaurs in the Bible? The Watchtower's current position on the dinosaurs can be found on jw org under the article:"What Does the Bible Say About Dinosaurs?"
A couple of interesting paragraphs from this article have this to say:
What happened to the dinosaurs?
The Bible does not comment on the disappearance of the dinosaurs. However, it does state that all things were created “because of [God’s] will,” so God clearly had a purpose for making dinosaurs. (Revelation 4:11) When that purpose was fulfilled, God allowed the dinosaurs to become extinct.
When did the dinosaurs live?
The Bible describes sea and land animals as being created during the fifth and sixth days, or epochs, of creation. * (Genesis 1:20-25, 31) Thus, the Bible allows for the appearance and existence of dinosaurs over a lengthy period of time.
There was a time the Watchtower entertained far more exotic theories on the subject of dinosaurs. One such idea appeared in The Golden Age(what Awake! Magazine Used be called) of April 1, 1931 on page 428. In describing the planets of the Solar System they mention Venus by saying:
"It will be very apparent to readers of Judge Rutherford's book Creation that the present condition of Venus is about what the earth was prior to the Flood, and it is significant that some astronomers have advanced the idea that animals like the dinosaurs that once roamed this planet are now finding Venus a happy place in which to live."
One thing about the Golden Age quotations that I have noticed is that some of the most outrageous ideas found their way into its pages. Whether they were official WT dogma, commonly believed ideas among the JW/Bible Students, or simply the rogue rant of the Golden Age editor Clayton Woodworth,
You may ask how bizarre theory was ever allowed to be printed and yet many others promoted this idea in the 19th and the first part ofthe 20th century.
The clouded view on Venus lead to many speculations about the potential habitability of the planet. Astronomers and science fiction authors speculated about dinosaur-like creatures on its surface way back in the 1930's even up to 1950's but once the first probes were send to space and other planets including Venus photos of the planet's atmosphere were send back back to earth and these theories were dismissed .As we know now Venus is the totally unhospitable tfor life
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