I have finished reading a book on geology, and have some thoughts on “erratics.”  Erratics are “wandering rocks,” or rocks out of place.  They are rocks located far from their points of origin, usually carried to their locations by glaciers or floating ice.

For example, near Sheridan, Oregon, in the Willamette Valley, is a 90-ton boulder which originated in the northern Rocky Mountains.  It theoretically floated there, encased in ice, a distance of over 500 miles.  Prehistorically, it is thought that western Montana, on the west side of the Rocky Mountains, was a huge lake, dammed near the Idaho border by a glacier.

At least once, and probably multiple times, perhaps more than 80, the glacier that formed the ice dam broke, causing floods of gargantuan proportions.  The floods scoured eastern Washington, removing all the soil, and deposited much of it in the Willamette Valley, making the Willamette Valley a rich farming area.  The flood cut canyons through the underlying basalt rock which are hundreds of feet deep.  Walls of water 500 feet high thundered across the terrain preceded by hurricane-force winds of the flood’s own making.  The floods filled vast Washington basins, over-topped the high places, and spilled into the Snake River.  So high were the waters of the flood that they reversed the flow of the Snake River for several miles upstream while the rest of the flood thundered hundreds of feet deep through the Columbia River Gorge on its way to the Pacific Ocean.  As the gorge widened at Portland, the floodwaters spread over the entire Willamette Valley to a depth of perhaps 400 feet.

Riding along in the flood were rock-bearing icebergs.  The rocks were granitic, and were deposited where the ice was snagged and held by submerged high spots.  Thus it was that the boulder near Sheridan floated there.  The same is true of the many erratic granite boulders that are found throughout the scablands of eastern Washington sometimes right on top of basaltic columns and tables.

A geologist by the name of J Harlan Bretz first hypothesized in the 1920s that the scablands of eastern Washington were caused by a flood of cataclysmic proportions.  Geologic thought of the time had no room for cataclysmic events.  Geologists one-hundred years ago almost unanimously subscribed to the idea of uniformitarianism which states that geologic processes take place uniformly over vast periods of time.  Bretz was ridiculed and attacked by his colleagues for his ridiculous interpretation of the data he had meticulously collected over a decade of exploring the Washington scablands, the Snake River channel, and the Columbia Gorge.

Eminent geologists freely criticized Bretz and offered their own theories of how the scablands formed.  Many, relying upon the word of others, didn’t even bother to go see for themselves.  Bretz’s theories didn’t fit with prevailing thought, so a trip to Washington was beneath them, and not worth the effort.

One decades-long detractor finally paid a visit to Palouse Falls in Washington where the 6-foot-wide ribbon that is the Palouse River plunges over a 600-foot-wide basalt lip, falls 200 feet into a gargantuan plunge pool too large to have been created by the paltry stream, and then exits through a canyon that is deeply impressive.  The skeptical geologist swallowed his pride and exclaimed, “How could anyone have been so wrong?”  (Bretz’s Flood, John Soennichsen, pg. 228).

The treatment Bretz received from his colleagues was little different than the reception of other erratic ideas proposed by other free thinkers.  These free-thinkers, like the granite rock near Sheridan, were erratics.

One of those erratics was Alfred Wegener, a German who, in 1910, noticed that the east coast of South America was the same shape as the west coast of Africa.  He researched his theory that the two continents had once been joined, published a book in 1915 entitled “The Origin of Continents and Oceans,” and was dismissed, ridiculed, rejected, and joked about until his death in 1930.  Wegener claimed that all seven continents had once been part of one supercontinent which he called “Pangaea.”  His ideas were considered ridiculous.  Everyone knew that massive landforms don’t move.

Wegener’s work was done before other scientists developed the theory of plate tectonics.  Measurements and research have now confirmed that Wegener’s theories were right, and that the continents are moving.  Posthumously Wegener’s erratic ideas have become accepted scientific thought.

Modern scientists are now in tune with Wegener, and are of the opinion that the continental drift that created the Atlantic and other oceans took place over eons of time.  I think, however that they have discounted an important piece of evidence that, like Bretz’s flood, would indicate a cataclysmic, rather than a uniformitarian, event.  That evidence is a verse in the Bible (Genesis 10:25) which says that Peleg, number 15 in the line of patriarchs, was born in the days when the earth was divided.  That bit of information indicates that the division of the landmass was a huge, noteworthy event rather than an imperceptible drift.

My idea, however, would be considered erratic.

Another erratic was Galileo.  He was a man out of step with his time and place.  Unlike his geocentric contemporaries, represented by the Catholic Church, he was heliocentric, meaning that he believed the sun to be the center of a solar system.  In contrast, everyone else believed the earth to be the center of the universe, with everything revolving around it.  Galileo was summoned before the Inquisition in 1633 and tried for heresy.  He spent the last 9 years of his life under house arrest.

He said, “I wish that we might laugh at the remarkable stupidity of the common herd.  What do you have to say about the principle philosophers of this academy who are filled with the stubbornness of an asp and do not want to look at either the planets, the moon or the telescope, even though I have freely and deliberately offered them the opportunity a thousand times? ... These philosophers shut their eyes to the light of truth.”

Christopher Columbus was an erratic.  He was a lone voice declaring that the earth was round.  He turned the key that proved it.

William Tyndale was an erratic.  He believed that reading the Bible in one’s own language should be the right and privilege of every individual, and that the scriptures should not be left to the dubious interpretations of priests.  He translated the Bible into English, a fledgling language not deemed worthy of the Holy Scriptures.  Seventy-five-percent of our King James Version is in his words.

Joseph Smith was an erratic.  In a world that declared revelation to be a thing of the past, that there could be no scripture other than the Bible, and that God and Jesus were an unknowable, mysterious, disembodied power, Joseph said, “Not so.”  He was hated, persecuted, and eventually killed for his erratic views.

J Harlan Bretz had the satisfaction of living long enough to see his flood theory accepted as fact by the scientific community.

Alfred Wegener died in 1930 while still quietly carrying on his researches.  It had been 15 years since the publishing of his erratic book, and his ideas were still being joked about.

Galileo stuck to the principles he knew to be true, though he was forced to kneel before the inquisitors and recant his findings at the threat of being tortured and killed.  Following his death others looked through his telescope, and the whole world embraced the truths he had tried so hard to get them to see.  It wasn’t until 1992, 359 years later, after a 13-year investigation, that the church formally apologized for its treatment of Galileo, but he didn’t have the satisfaction of hearing it.

After 67 days of sailing fruitlessly across an empty ocean Christopher Columbus was faced with mutiny by the crews of his three ships.  He promised the rebellious men that if land was not sighted in three more days they would turn back.  He betook himself to fervent prayer.  To the relief of all, land was sighted on the morning of the third day.  He had the satisfaction of seeing himself proved right.

William Tyndale did not.  He was tied to a stake, strangled, and burned for the heretical act of translating the Bible into English.  His last words were a prayer that the Lord would open the eyes of the king of England.  The prayer was answered just three years later as Henry VIII placed English Bibles in all the churches.

Joseph Smith had the satisfaction of seeing The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints grow from a handful of people in 1830 to an army tens of thousands strong at the time of his martyrdom 14 years later.  But the work he started has only just begun.  Like a heavy train just getting underway, the Church is picking up speed.  Now 16 million strong, it is on its way toward fulfilling Joseph’s prophecy that it will fill the earth.

Truth cannot be stopped.  It can be delayed, derided, and have its detractors; but when those detractors lower themselves to actually visit the falls, to look through the telescope, or to read the Book of Mormon their eyes become opened, and they find themselves exclaiming about themselves, “How could anyone have been so wrong?!”