Is the Pangea theory compatible with the Bible? Does the Bible talk about a Pangea / Pangaea?
Pangea is the idea that all the continents were at one time joined together. It is presented as a fact, and backed up by the existence of continental drift—the movement of the continents in relationship to one another. Over millions of years, it has been postulated, continental drift is responsible for moving the continents from one large land mass to the separate land masses we have today. Plate tectonics theorizes further how volcanic activity, and earthquakes, factor into the movement of the plates and the construction of mountains and trenches. The shape of the continents gives further evidence for the idea that they were once joined together (example: the puzzle-piece appearance of South America and Africa).
There are a few verses that can be used to support the idea of Pangea. First, during creation, God said "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear" (Genesis 1:9). All the water being gathered to one place implies that all the dry ground was also in one place. Also, there is the account of Peleg, in whose "days the earth was divided" (Genesis 10:25). Peleg's name means "earthquake" and the Hebrew word for earth here is erets, meaning land, earth, field or ground. This does not necessarily prove Pangea, but it does seem to indicate that an extraordinary geological event took place around the time of Peleg's birth. This was just after the Noahic flood.
The Bible does not mention Pangea, but it does make clear that the earth was created in six days by God, instead of being formed over millions of years. Does this mean that, according to Scripture, Pangea is an impossibility? Perhaps. But there is nothing to say that God could not have caused Pangea to occur quickly, rather than over millions of years. Some have speculated that this could have occurred after the Noahic flood. The Bible mentions a great rain that occurred to cause the flood, but also that "the fountains of the great deep burst forth" (Genesis 7:11). If this was enough water to cover the entire land mass, it may also have been enough water pressure to split apart the continents.
One compelling argument for Pangea is the question of how land-dwelling species like lizards migrated from one place to another. Did they construct rafts to get from India to Australia? Probably not. Some have proposed the idea that land bridges were still exposed after the Noahic flood (either because of a larger amount of ice at the poles, or for some other unknown reason) and those bridges allowed for migration to occur. Land bridges do exist, connecting the continents, and these intercontinental bridges are only a few hundred feet below the surface of the sea in some areas.
Again, Pangea is not mentioned in the Bible, but the Bible does not say Pangea didn't occur. The biggest discrepancy between scientific theory and the biblical record is the issue of how Pangea occurred from a young earth viewpoint. But even this does not disprove Pangea, it only gives us a reason to think that Pangea occurred more rapidly, or in some way that we have not yet discovered.
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