REFILL THE EARTH?
Gen 1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Gen 9:1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
Gap Theorists Version:
Gen 1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and refill the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Gen 9:1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and refill the earth.
I do not have the time to provide a detailed explanation of gap theories, but the essence of it can be boiled down to a short paragraph. Gap theorists are reluctant to believe what the Bible tells them and give precedence to modern science falsely so called. They have been convinced that the world is billions of years old by the theories of these scientists, who are almost invariably evolutionists. Positing such a belief is positing that the Bible is wrong, and there is no way around such a conclusion. There is ample evidence that man and dinosaurs (dragons) lived side by side, and still do to an extent, but they have been fooled by the lies of evolutionists, and have failed to either reason it out, or to put their faith in God over man. Instead, of choosing between trusting God’s word and the words of modern scientists, gap theorists propose that there is a gap in the world of billions of years, which they put after the first day of creation, or they spread them around throughout the first few days. The absurdity of inserting billions of years between the first sentences of the Bible is apparent and anyone Christian or non-Christian can easily pick apart such theories, so I will not do so here. There are plenty of books that do so amply well, and the books written by gap theorists to support their theories are even more convincing of the folly of gap theories than those that counter them. Look at books by Ross and Stoner for examples of some of the shallowest argumentation. Such books fool only the most gullible, and make non-Christians look upon them as being pseudo-scientists, as well as pseudo-theologians.
What I will discuss here is the translation of “replenish” and “refill”, which is done in order to posit a mythological pre-Adamic creation. A period of billions of years when dinosaurs, and other prehistoric creatures roamed the earth. This would imply that there also were pre-Adamic humanlike creatures. The gap theorists, or gappists as some call them, do not actually publish a Bible that changes replenish to refill in the text, but they do so in footnotes and in their “corrective” writings much the way the way Scofield, Ryrie, and Thompson Chain references Bibles do. All of this basically rests on the meaning of one word: replenish. Unfortunately for gap theorists, their theory is nothing more than vanity, for it rests on empty air. There is absolutely nothing to support their pipe dream that replenish means refill in Genesis.
Definition of Replenish
The first piece of evidence against this wild theory is the dictionary definition of replenish. Gappers will incessantly throw out the modern dictionary meaning of “replenish” without giving any consideration to what it might have meant in the first decade of the 17th century. Modern dictionaries will include the meaning “to fill” in their definitions, but gappers will conveniently gloss over it in the most unscholarly way possible. They will not mention that definition’s inclusion in modern dictionaries, let alone take the time to check with an older dictionary, or a lexicon that includes dates of usage.
Webster’s Dictionary of 1828 is favored by a lot of Christians, and gives us a more distant look at the usages of the word:
” REPLEN’ISH, v.t. [L. re and plenus, full.]
1. To fill; to stock with numbers or abundance. The magazines are replenished with corn. The springs are replenished with water. Multiply and replenish the earth. Gen. 1.
2. To finish; to complete. [Not in use.]
REPLEN’ISH, v.i. To recover former fullness.”
Note that the latter definition is given for the intransitive use of the verb. The two Genesis verbs used by gappers to promote gap theories are both transitive. This shows us that even as late as 1828, the meaning of refill was not common. So uncommon that Webster did not even list it, except in an intransitive sense.
Webster’s is a very valuable resource, but the Oxford Dictionary is much more useful than Webster’s for giving a complete definition, and it goes back much further. It also provides time periods for various meanings and uses, as well as historical examples. I have reproduced the entire entry from the Oxford Universal Dictionary below. The unabridged Oxford might have even more detail, but it is unnecessary since the Universal includes plenty of detail to contradict gap theorist views.
Replenish v. ME> [f. OF repleniss, replenir; see RE-and Plenish.] I. pass. (Obs. exc. as direct pass. Of II.) 1. To be fully or abundantly stocked with. b. To be provided or furnished with 1533. 2. To be filled, or fully imbued with some quality or condition -1702. 3. To be physically or materially filled with 1490. I. b. His intellect is not replenished, hee is onely an animall SHAKS. 3. Generally all the earth is replenished with Brimstone 1490. II. 1. trans. To make full of, to fill, stock or store abundantly with persons or animals -1596. 2. To occupy (a place) as inhabitants or settlers, to inhabit, people -1788. b. To occupy (a space or thing). Now rare. 1563. 3. To fill with food; to satiate -1665. 4. To fill (a place or space) with something -1615. 5. To fill up again; to restore to the former amount or condition 1612. 6. intr. To become filled; to attain to fullness; to increase (rare) 1579. a. The vacant habitations were replenished by a new colony GIBBON. 5. Full of wants of money and much stores to buy, for to r. the stores, and no money to do it with PEPYS. 6. Her Coffers began to r., Her Subjects were rich 1673.
Robert Cawdrey’s “A Table Alphabetical” of 1604 provides the following short but sweet definition: “Replenish: to fill.” A perusal of other old dictionaries would doubtless provide more evidence, but this is more than enough.
Replenish was a fairly rare word in early English literature, but when it shows up before the latter half of the 18th century it always meant to fill, not to refill. The word shows up three times in the writings of Shakespeare. The first occurrence is in Love’s Labour Lost, which was written somewhere around 1595 or 1596. Dull, as his name implies is one of the fools, or clowns, of the drama. He is overheard talking nonsense to himself and his overheard by Holofernes and Sir Nathaniel. Holofernes remarks on the ignorance of Dull to Sir Nathaniel. “Twice-sod simplicity, his coctus! O thou monster Ignorance, how deformed dost thou look!” Nathaniel’s response begins with the following words:
“Sir, he hath never fed of the dainties that are bred in a book; he hath not eat paper, as it were; he hath not drunk ink: his intellect is not replenished; he is only an animal, only sensible in the duller parts:”
It is obvious that his mind is an empty vessel that has never been filled, not one that was once filled and later emptied and in need of refilling. Arguing the latter would be ludicrous, and would rob the lines of their coherence, much the way gappers rob the Genesis passages of their coherence.
The word appears again in Lucrece, which was written in .
“His kindled duty kindled her mistrust, That two red fires in both their faces blazed; She thought he blush’d, as knowing Tarquin’s lust, And, blushing with him, wistly on him gazed; Her earnest eye did make him more amazed: The more she saw the blood his cheeks replenish, The more she thought he spied in her some blemish.
Here, we plainly read a reference to a single occurrence of blushing, which is a filling of the cheeks with blood. No one, except for the silliest of devil’s advocates, would suggest that this is a reference to the cheeks filling with blood after being emptied of it.
In the fourth act of Richard III we find the third occurrence of replenish. Here Tyrrel makes reference to the bounty of nature
But O! the devil’–there the villain stopp’d Whilst Dighton thus told on: ‘We smothered
The most replenished sweet work of nature, That from the prime creation e’er she framed.’ Thus both are gone with conscience and remorse; They could not speak; and so I left them both, To bring this tidings to the bloody king. And here he comes.
This is a reference to a murder. The replenished sweet work of nature refers to the human life that was snuffed out by Richard. The purport here is that the victim was filled with life. Are we to think that he had been refilled with life?
The word also appears in Laurence Sterne’s (1713 to 1768) Tristram Shandy: “both great and small, be so replenish’d, saturated, and filled up therewith.” The latter clause is an example of the common literary device of clustering synonyms. All three words mean the same thing, but are used for poetic emphasis. The use of this literary device is found throughout the literature of most languages, including the Hebrew of the Bible (especially in the Psalms), and in the poetry of virtually all languages.1 I encountered the following example in Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame: “buried, emured and entombed.” Examples could be given for hundreds of pages.
Spenser’s (1552-1599) Faerie Queen, which was written shortly before the King James Bible’s publication contains the following example: “sent Into the world, it to replenish more; Yet is the stocke not lessened.”Who on earth would suggest that this means refill.
Anyone who would suggest that refill is meant in Ben Johnson’s (1572-1637) Every Man out of His Humour needs to sharpen their reading comprehension skills. “If it were the basest filth, or mud that runs in the channel, I am replenish’d bowl, which I will reciprocally turn upon you, to the health of the count Frugale.” Replenish also appears in Johnson’s Epicoene “Come, name dulls appetite. Here, replenish again: another bout.” Here the word “again” is added to show that the cups are being refilled. “Replenish” by itself was not sufficient to make this clear in the early 17th century when Johnson wrote Epicoene.
The last example is from one of my favorite satirists, Jonathan Swift (1667-1745), who used “replenish” in Gulliver’s Travels: “he withdrew the instrument to replenish it, clapping his thumb strongly.” Most examples after this time period did use “replenish” in the sense of “refill” much of the time, but the meaning to fill did not die out by any means.
Hebrew Definition
The evidence that the 17th century meaning of “replenish” was to fill is overwhelming, but we do not even need it. We do have the Hebrew text as evidence.
Some KJV Only advocates have made a rule that Hebrew and Greek should not be considered in an argument. Gap theorists especially love this rule. I do not follow it because it is a stupid rule. The KJV is an accurate translation of the Bible, therefore its wording reflects what the Hebrew and Greek say. Gap theorists would especially like to ignore the Hebrew in these passages, because doing so blows their nonsensical mythmaking about refilling to smithereens. The Hebrew word “male” (pronounced mah-ley) simply means to fill. If the Hebrew had intended “refill” it would have said fill again or fill a second time, and it would have to do so since there would be no other way to say refill.
There are three main words that were used in Biblical Hebrew to indicate again: shub, yatsaf , ‘od, and sheniy (also translated as a second time). These words show up with great frequency in the Hebrew Old Testament. The examples are abundant, but the following covers all three of these words.
Gen 24:5 And the servant said unto him, Peradventure the woman will not be willing to follow me unto this land: must I needs bring thy son again [shub] unto the land from whence thou camest?
Gen 18:29 And he spake unto him yet again [yatsaf], and said, Peradventure there shall be forty found there. And he said, I will not do it for forty’s sake.
Gen 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again [‘od]; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.
Mal 2:13 And this have ye done again (sheniy), covering the altar of the LORD with tears, with weeping, and with crying out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more, or receiveth it with good will at your hand.
I do not have the time to check each passages context, but “again” shows up in the Old Testament 431 times. “Second time” shows up 20 times, most usually a translation of sheniy. None of these words show up conjunction with male anywhere in the Bible, let alone in the passages in question.
There is no occurrence of any of these adverbs to modify the meaning of “male” in any of the verses that include the word “replenish” in their translation, nor are there any words of any kind that could remotely be claimed to imply repetition. Of course, this won’t matter to gappers any more than the overwhelming evidence from early English. Their agenda is more important than truth, and logic has no place in their theories.
The preposterous argument that the Hebrew text used by the KJV translators might have been different from any that we have might be made by really persistent gappers, but we have sufficient examples from other languages of the same general time period, including earlier translations, to show that not one single translation exists in which anyone ever thought that “male” meant to refill.
Luther translated it with “füllen” and “erfüllen”, the latter meaning fill up.
Gen 1:28 Und Gott segnete sie und sprach zu ihnen: Seid fruchtbar und mehrt euch und füllt die Erde und macht sie euch untertan und herrscht über die Fische im Meer und über die
Gen 9:1 Und Gott segnete Noah und seine Söhne und sprach: Seid fruchtbar und mehrt euch und erfüllt die Erde.
The Spanish translated it with “henchir”, which means to fill.
Gen 1:28 Y los bendijo Dios; y díjoles Dios: Fructificad y multiplicad, y henchid la tierra, y sojuzgadla, y señoread en los peces de la mar, y en las aves de los cielos, y en todas las bestias que se mueven sobre la tierra.
Gen 9:1 Y BENDIJO Dios á Noé y á sus hijos, y díjoles: Fructificad, y multiplicad, y henchid la tierra:
The Ostervald, Martin, Louis Segonde, and one could probably assume all French versions use remplir. While there is an “emplir” that means to fill, it is virtually unused, while “remplir” is almost invariably used for the verb to fill. I cannot recall ever seeing the verb “emplir” in thousands of pages of French reading.
The LXX has plethenesthe in Gen 1:28 and plerosate in Gen. 9:1, both of which simply mean to fill. The Greek terms for refilling are anamestew and anapleserow, both utilizing the Greek preposition meaning again, which is ana-.
Other passages in the KJV that use the word “replenish” all come from “male” as well.
Isa 2:6 Therefore thou hast forsaken thy people the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they please themselves in the children of strangers.
Isa 23:2 Be still, ye inhabitants of the isle; thou whom the merchants of Zidon, that pass over the sea, have replenished.
Jer 31:25 For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul.
Eze 26:2 Son of man, because that Tyrus hath said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken that was the gates of the people: she is turned unto me: I shall be replenished, now she is laid waste:
Eze 27:25 The ships of Tarshish did sing of thee in thy market: and thou wast replenished, and made very glorious in the midst of the seas.
In all of these cases we find them translated with the same words in their respective languages, all meaning to fill. An exception is Spanish where it is “to become full” (sére llena) shows up once or twice, which is even more clear than henchir.
Wycliffe translated every one of these occurences with the verb to fill (OE fyllan, ME fill-) in the 14th century.
Gen 1:28 28 And God blesside hem, and seide, Encreesse ye, and be ye multiplied, and fille ye the erthe, and make ye it suget, and be ye lordis to fischis of the see, and to volatilis of heuene, and to alle lyuynge beestis that ben moued on erthe.
Gen 9:1 1 And God blisside Noe and hise sones, and seide to hem, Encreesse ye, and be ye multiplied, and fille ye the erthe;
Isaiah 2:6 Forsothe thou hast cast awei thi puple, the hous of Jacob, for thei ben fillid as sum tyme bifore; and thei hadden false dyuynouris bi the chiteryng of briddis, as Filisteis, and thei cleuyden to alien children.
Isaiah 23:2 Be ye stille, that dwellen in the ile, the marchaundie of Sidon; men passynge the see filliden thee in many watris;
Jeremiah 31:25 For Y fillide greetli a feynt soule, and Y haue fillid ech hungri soule.
Ezekiel 26:2 Thou, sone of man, for that that Tire seide of Jerusalem, Wel! the yatis of puplis ben brokun, it is turned to me; Y schal be fillid, it is forsakun;
Ezekiel 27:25 Also schippis of the see hadden cedris in her marchaundies; thi princes weren in thi marchaundie; and thou were fillid, and were glorified greetli in the herte of the see.
Finally, we should look at Tyndale’s translation of the Genesis passages:
Gen 1:28 and God blessed them saynge. Growe and multiplye a¯d fyll the waters of the sees / & let the foules multiplye vp o¯ the erth. And so of the evenynge & morninge was made the fyfth daye.
Gen 9:l AND God blessed Noe and his sonnes / and sayd vnto them: Increase and multiplye and fyll the erth.
Obviously, Tyndale and his predecessors did not think that there was a pre-Adamic creation. Tyndale was a Bible translator and not an author of mythology. Anyone who wants a much lengthier collection of translations as evidence should get a copy of Herb F.
Evan’s very lengthy list, which could probably be located through an internet search.
Re- in English
Finally, we will look at the words that begin with re- in English and examine their meaning. Re- was not used at all in English until the 16th century and then only sparingly until later in the 17th century. Its meaning is broad and was seldom attached to just any verb the way we might in English (rewind, rework, redo, etc.). With one possible exception, there is not one single verb in the King James Bible that begins with “re” that implies doing something a second time or again. For instance, “revive” means to bring to life again, but its meaning in the King James Bible is always to refresh, invigorate, strengthen or comfort.
When Lazarus is brought back from the dead, “revive” is not used, but he is said simply to have been “raised from the dead.” The only possible exception might be the verb “to reconcile”, but even that verb does not always imply that conciliation existed in the first place.
In most cases the re- prefix does not have anything at all to do with repetition, or that aspect of its meaning has been lost and replaced by an altered meaning, such as remove, return, respect, and so forth. This characteristic is due the same characteristic that is to be found in the Latin prefix from which it is derived. Freund’s Dictionary lists the following meanings:
“back, in return, again, anew, against, to and fro, & c.; it sometimes reverses the signif. of the simple verb, as in recludo; and sometimes adds nothing to the sense of the simple verb.”
Nevertheless, most gappers will not care what the evidence is, and they will continue to make the same arguments based on 20th and 21st century dictionaries. For these gappers I have made some Bible interpretations that might interest them that relate to other words beginning with re-.
De 19:14 Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land that the LORD thy God giveth thee to possess it.
Interpretation: This means that it is okay to move it once, but not to move it a second time.
Gen 8:3 And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated.
Interpreation: The waters turned on the earth once and started turning again.
Gen 7:23 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.
Interpretation: Noah and his family dwelt or inhabited the earth a second time.
Gen 8:2 The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained;
Interpretation: The rain was strained for a second time.
Gen 8:1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters asswaged;
Interpretation: God replaced the limbs of Noah and every living thing with with knew and better ones after the flood.
Gen 14:4 Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled.
Interpretation: They rang the bell again.
Gen 20:7 Now therefore restore the man his wife; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live: and if thou restore her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine.
Interpretation: The wife should be stored in a different place than before.
Gen 20:16 And unto Sarah he said, Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, he is to thee a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with thee, and with all other: thus she was reproved.
Interpretation: She was proven to be genuine a second time.
Gen 39:8 But he refused, and said unto his master’s wife, Behold, my master wotteth not what is with me in the house, and he hath committed all that he hath to my hand;
Interpretation: He (Joseph) fused with Potiphah’s wife a second time.
Ex 18:9 And Jethro rejoiced for all the goodness which the LORD had done to Israel, whom he had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians.
Interpretation: Jethro felt joy a second time.
Ps 72:14 He shall redeem their soul from deceit and violence: and precious shall their blood be in his sight.
Interpretation: He shall deem, or consider, their soul a second time.
Eze 14:6 Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations.
Interpretation: Pent yourselves up away from your idols again.
Nu 18:9 This shall be thine of the most holy things, reserved from the fire: every oblation of theirs, every meat offering of theirs, and every sin offering of theirs, and every trespass offering of theirs, which they shall render unto me, shall be most holy for thee and for thy sons.
Interpretation: The holy things were cooked better than served again.
1 Sam 30:8 And David enquired at the LORD, saying, Shall I pursue after this troop? shall I overtake them? And he answered him, Pursue: for thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all.
Interpretation: They will cover it all after having been uncovered.
Summary
It is clear from lexicographical evidence from English and Hebrew that replenish did not mean to refill in the KJV. It is equally clear that none of the translators of old versions of any language thought that it meant to refill. Furthermore, evidence from literary sources and philological sources confirm what is already obvious from the above mentioned evidence.
Finally, reason, logic, and spiritual discernment all make the whole argument unnecessary, because the Bible has nothing to say about a gap of millions or billions of years in Genesis. It is made up by science fiction writers and fantasy authors pretending to be theologians. If gap theorists want to believe that the earth was refilled by Adam and Eve after billions of years of God-guided evolution, fine, let them think so, but they ought to stop injecting this idea into the text of the Bible and confine their idea to the world of creative writing where it belongs.
Just to be fair, I will present a complete list of all of the translations that support the gap theorists judgment that replenish meant to refill. I will include all of those references from both ancient sources, as well as those that are coming from the Westcott-Hort, Bible perversion side. The complete list comprises of the following:
1 I have found it particularly heavy in Farsi poetry, but English poetry is not at all lacking in the device.
John Hinton, Ph.D.
Bible Restoration Ministry
A ministry seeking the translating and reprinting of KJV equivalent
Bibles in all the languages of the world.