In The Broken Gift, Daniel Friedmann takes us on a fascinating journey through the Old Testament, the Torah and currently accepted scientific theories and shows us how these could actually be telling the same exact story of the creation of our universe and the birth of mankind. But how could they be the same when the Bible and Torah tell us the earth and the heavens were created in 7 days and The Big Bang Theory tells us it was millions of years? Is there some way these seemingly different accounts could be telling the exact same story? According to Friedmann that is entirely possible. And in this book he explains how.

This isn’t light reading, but it’s written in layman’s terms, not like a physics book or technical journal. Because these are big ideas to wrap the mind around on a philosophical level, I found myself reading over some pages a couple of times, but not because it was difficult reading. The way he presents these ideas is very thought provoking. I didn’t find any of his ideas to be anti religion or anything like that. In fact, it was kind of comforting to see a way for them to reconcile with each other intellectually.

The book is divided into 12 chapters, each covering different aspects of these huge concepts. Friedman relies on Jewish teachings (of which The Old Testament is a major part) for the religious story of creation. He addresses such things as fossil records, radiometric dating, The Genome Projects, explanations of Biblical passages, oral history, the creation of man, the Flood, Babel, and the conversion of time. I found the conversion of time the most interesting chapters in the book. The question of time, for many people is always the most difficult problem in reconciling science and creationism. Friedman gives an explanation of how the two could actually be the same. One thing I wish he had stressed a little more is the idea that time on earth and time in outer space has actually be measured by astronauts to be different, even though man has only been able to travel a short distance into space. So time on earth and time billions of light years away could actually be different although experienced at the same “time”. (Does that make sense?)

Friedman includes many tables and references including timeline that make it easier to visualize some of these ideas. He also includes a glossary and annexes of Genesis, Divine Time and the Flood background.

I received a complementary review copy of this book.

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