Rubies Don’t Require Millions Of Year To Form

Rubies Don’t Require Millions Of Year To Form

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, March 2, 2026 (Donate)

The True Jewler website states,

“Real rubies are rare, expensive, and take millions of years to form under extreme heat and pressure….Ruby gemstones don’t appear overnight. They take millions of years to form deep inside the Earth….The formation timeline depends on local geology, but generally ranges between 20 and 60 million years….In nature, rubies form under intense heat and pressure over millions of years.”[1]

Growing up, I was repeatedly taught it takes millions of years to form precious gems like rubies. But do they?

Keep in mind that no one has ever observed rubies forming over long ages like millions of years. This is and arbitrary speculation based on the secular worldview. As a biblical creationist, I don’t believe rubies requires millions of years to form.

What Are Rubies?

Rubies are the red variety of corundum, chemically aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃) colored by small amounts of chromium (Cr₃+). In nature, rubies form under high-temperature and high-pressure metamorphic or magmatic conditions—this includes catastrophic volcanic activity.

Uncut rubies have a deep red luster; Image requested by Bodie Hodge (ChatGPT)

Thanks to modern materials science, researchers have developed several methods to grow rubies rapidly in laboratory environments. These methods rely on controlled heat, pressure, and the right materials to form conditions that promote crystal growth in hours, days, or weeks rather than long age timescales. Let’s take a look at these processes.

Verneuil Process (Flame Fusion)

One of the earliest and fastest techniques is the Verneuil process, also known as flame fusion. It was developed in 1902 by Auguste Verneuil. This method involves feeding finely powdered aluminum oxide mixed with chromium oxide through an oxyhydrogen flame.

The powder melts in the flame and falls onto a rotating support, where the molten droplets accumulate and solidify into a cylindrical crystal mass called a “boule”. Because the material solidifies from the melt in a continuous stream, a large synthetic ruby can be produced in a matter of hours.

Although flame-fusion rubies often contain curved growth lines and occasional gas bubbles (called “porosity” think of a pumice stone that only has an occasion little air-bubble hole), the process remains extremely efficient and cost-effective for both gem and industrial uses.

Czochralski Process

Another rapid method is the Czochralski process, developed by Jan Czochralski in 1916. In this technique, aluminum oxide is melted in a high-temperature crucible at approximately 2050°C.

A small seed crystal is dipped into the molten material and slowly withdrawn while rotating. As it is pulled upward, the crystal grows from the melt in a controlled orientation. Depending on the size desired, high-quality ruby crystals can be produced within hours to several days. This method allows excellent control over crystal structure and purity and is widely used for optical and laser-grade materials.

Flux Growth Method

The flux growth method more closely resembles certain natural crystallization processes. In this approach, aluminum oxide—which is a ruby—is dissolved in a molten flux, which acts as a “solvent” at high temperature. Common fluxes include lead oxide or molybdate-based compounds.

As the solution cools slowly, ruby crystals precipitate out of the melt and grow over time. Although slower than flame fusion, flux-grown rubies can still form within weeks. They often display growth features that more closely resemble natural stones, making them valuable in gemological applications where natural appearance is important.

Hydrothermal Method

The hydrothermal method uses high-temperature, high-pressure aqueous solutions inside sealed autoclaves. Under high pressures—commonly ranging from about 1 to 2 kilobars—and elevated temperatures, aluminum-bearing nutrients dissolve in superheated water.

The solution circulates within the vessel and deposits material onto seed crystals in a cooler region of the chamber. Crystal growth occurs over weeks to months. While not as fast as melt-based techniques, hydrothermal growth is still vastly accelerated compared to the allegation that it takes millions of years to form. And, it can produce high-clarity crystals with fewer structural defects.

Biblical Understanding

From a biblical viewpoint, some rubies were likely formed at creation. Some precious stones are mentioned in Genesis 2, but not rubies. Rubies are mentioned several times in Scriptures, being valuable stones. The Bible refences are (NKJV):

·       Job 28:18  No mention shall be made of coral or quartz, For the price of wisdom is above rubies.

·       Proverbs 3:15  She is more precious than rubies, And all the things you may desire cannot compare with her.

·       Proverbs 8:11  For wisdom is better than rubies, And all the things one may desire cannot be compared with her.

·       Proverbs 20:15  There is gold and a multitude of rubies, But the lips of knowledge are a precious jewel.

·       Proverbs 31:10  Who can find a virtuous wife? For her worth is far above rubies.

·       Isaiah 54:12  I will make your pinnacles of rubies, Your gates of crystal, And all your walls of precious stones.

·       Lamentations 4:7  Her Nazirites were brighter than snow And whiter than milk; They were more ruddy in body than rubies, Like sapphire in their appearance.

·       Ezekiel 27:16  “Syria was your merchant because of the abundance of goods you made. They gave you for your wares emeralds, purple, embroidery, fine linen, corals, and rubies.

The Flood of Noah’s day could have easily caused the natural conditions to form precious gemstones like rubies rather quickly. If we consider that at one point the entire land surface area was covered with water (e.g., Genesis 7:19).

This means that there was a significant mountain building phase with tectonic activity and immense volcanic catastrophes occurring at certain phases of the Flood (e.g., Genesis 8:4; Psalm 104:8-9). These conditions with immense heat and pressure are ripe for forming rubies given the correct materials were available.

Rubies are often found in layers associated with metaphoric rock and magma/lava-influenced deposits. Many rubies that are found in magmatic deposits or lava may have been brought up from some of these initially created or Flood-formed rubies—but let’s not neglect that some could have been formed as a result of the catastrophe of specific volcanoes themselves. Albeit, these would be rarer due to certain factors.[2]

Conclusion

These rapid-ruby forming methods that researchers have developed show that ruby crystals can be synthesized quickly when temperature, pressure, and chemical environment are favorable. If the conditions are right, they can form quickly—we know this scientifically.

By optimizing crystal growth conditions, laboratory processes dramatically accelerate crystallization giving us some clues how they can be formed quickly in nature, with heat, pressure and the right materials present.  

Further Reading And References

For more on rapid ruby production from a technical viewpoint please see (yes, one is in French!):

1.     Verneuil, A., “Production artificielle du rubis par fusion.” Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Sciences 138: 732–734, 1904.

2.     Nassau, K., Gems Made by Man. Radnor, PA: Chilton Book Company, 1980.

3.     Nassau, K., The Physics and Chemistry of Color: The Fifteen Causes of Color. 2nd ed. New York: Wiley, 2001.

4.     Brice, J. C., Crystal Growth Processes. Glasgow: Blackie and Son, 1986.

5.     Elwell, D., and H. J. Scheel, Crystal Growth from High-Temperature Solutions. London: Academic Press, 1975.

6.     Laudise, R. A., The Growth of Single Crystals. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1970.

7.     Scheel, H. J., and T. Fukuda, eds., Crystal Growth Technology. Chichester: Wiley, 2003.

 □

Bodie Hodge, Ken Ham's son in law, has been an apologist since 1998 helping out in various churches and running an apologetics website. He spent 21 years working at Answers in Genesis as a speaker, writer, and researcher as well as a founding news anchor for Answers News. He was also head of the Oversight Council.  

Bodie launched Biblical Authority Ministries in 2015 as a personal website and it was organized officially in 2025 as a 501(c)(3). He has spoken on multiple continents and hosts of US states in churches, colleges, and universities. He is married with four children.

Mr. Hodge earned a Bachelor and Master of Science degrees from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale (SIUC). Then he taught at SIUC for a couple of years as a Visiting Instructor teaching all levels of undergraduate engineering and running a materials lab and a CAD lab. He did research on advanced ceramic materials to develop a new method of production of titanium diboride with a grant from Lockheed Martin. He worked as a Test Engineer for Caterpillar, Inc., prior to entering full-time ministry.

His love of science was coupled with a love of history, philosophy, and theology. For about one year of his life, Bodie was editing and updating a theological, historical, and scientific dictionary/encyclopedia for AI use and training. Mr. Hodge has over 25 years of experience in writing, speaking and researching in these fields. 

---

[1] Sergey Suhorukov, How Is Ruby Formed? A Look at the Gem’s Geological Journey, TrueJeweler.com, June 8-25, 2025, https://truejeweller.com/how-does-a-ruby-form/.

[2]  From a techie perspective, these factors would include: pressure-temperature paths, isotopic equilibration, regional metamorphic zoning, and mineral chemistry.

 

Sapphires

Sapphires Don’t Take Millions Of Years To Form

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, September 25, 2024 (Donate)

 

Introduction

In the secular religion, the claim is that sapphires took millions of years to form. The story goes that deep within the Earth, heat and pressure slowly formed sapphires over long ages, such as through slow continental collisions.

These sapphires were supposedly transferred to the surface by magma or deposited in lava formations after an eruption. Sometimes secularists claim it was crustal plate movements that brought sapphires to the surface. Famous London jeweler David Morris states:

“No one is exactly sure how long-ago sapphire gemstones were formed. However, we do know that the sapphires which are discovered today were formed around 150 to 200 million years ago.”[1]

Morris goes on this say:

“Sapphire stones are formed deep within the Earth when aluminium and oxygen atoms combine under high heat and pressure. They develop slowly over millions of years in particular types of rocks.”[2]

I asked Google, “how are natural sapphires formed?” Google’s AI spit out the first sentences as:

“Sapphires are rare and valuable gemstones that are formed naturally over millions of years deep within the Earth's crust”[3]

Tyler Hayden, writing for the Natural History Museum quotes Dr. Aaron Celestian, Curator of Mineral Sciences that:

‘“If you look closely at it, you might see some bands of light-colored, dark color, light, dark, dark, light, dark, light, dark, and those are representative of the growth patterns of the mineral,”…“If there's a period of time where there's fast crystal growth, then one of those bands is going to be big. Or if there's a period of time where there's lots of impurities around, then one of those bands is going to be darker in color. So they're recording all those events that are taking place all in that one crystal.” There’s millions of years of geologic happenings in one dazzling blue package.’[4]

The point is that many have espoused millions of years of unobserved and unrepeated time as the origin of sapphires. This is a religious commitment, not a scientific one, and I think that is worth noting.

Interestingly, secular researchers have challenged some of these claims—whether they meant to or not—based on research samples in volcanic deposits from Eifel, Germany. Let’s take a look at an overview of this research.

Eifel Research?

Researchers collected sapphire samples from volcanic rock layers in Eifel, Germany, from Cretaceous rock (Flood rock). They studied these samples and concluded that sapphires within them were formed far more recently, during a newer eruptive phase of the volcano when either magma or lava was flowing. It was when the lava or magma was interacting with the clayey material near the surface, introducing the necessary impurities to form sapphire.

The point is that these sapphires were not formed deep in the Earth under extreme heat and pressure over long periods of time and then transported to the surface. Instead, they were actually formed near the surface with the heat, necessary elements, and sufficient pressure to do the job rapidly before cooling and solidifying.

What this means is that deep time is not necessary for the formation of the sapphires in this region—just the right conditions: heat, some pressure, and the right elements in the right quantities. In fact, that was all that was ever needed. “Millions of years” were never required to form natural sapphires.

What Is Sapphire?

Sapphire is a crystal oxide in the corundum mineral family—aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃) to be specific. When it contains certain trace elements, it can take on different tints and colors. Rubies are also in the corundum mineral family. When Al₂O₃ contains iron, it turns deep red and is called a ruby.

So rubies and sapphires are essentially the same thing, with different types of trace elements in them. Rubies are a specific form with iron traces, while sapphires result from other trace elements instead of iron.

Other gemstones have entirely different chemical compositions. For example, diamonds are pure carbon (C), emeralds are Be₃Al₂(SiO₃)₆, topaz is Al₂SiO₄(F,OH)₂, amethysts are SiO₂, and carnelian (sardion/sardius) is also SiO₂, with traces of iron oxide (hematite), which gives it a reddish to orangish hue.

Corundum (aluminum oxide, e.g., Al₂O₃) usually contains traces of titanium, iron, vanadium, or chromium, but sometimes other trace elements as well. If it were completely pure, without any trace elements, it would be clear, as the trace elements give it its luster.

As a crystal, sapphires and rubies have a crystal structure. There are various types of crystalline structures, such as body-centered cubic (BCC), face-centered cubic (FCC), or hexagonal. Sapphires and rubies, being aluminum oxide, have a natural hexagonal crystal structure.

The Bible mentions rubies 8 times (Job 28:18; Proverbs 3:15, 8:11, 20:15, 31:10; Isaiah 54:12; Lamentations 4:7; Ezekiel 27:16), and sapphires are mentioned 12 times (Exodus 24:10, 28:18, 39:11; Job 28:6, 28:16; Song of Solomon 5:14; Lamentations 4:7; Isaiah 54:11; Ezekiel 1:26, 10:1, 28:13; Revelation 21:19). Many other gemstones are also mentioned in Scripture.

Does It Require Millions Of Years To Form Sapphires And Rubies?

But does it really take millions of years to make these precious gems? No. It is common to find gemstones like sapphires (and rubies) in volcanic deposits. This indicates a relationship between rapid production and volcanic conditions.

Furthermore, researchers have known how to make sapphires and rubies in labs for years, and lab-grown gems are commonly found in jewelry today. No long ages are required. One of the primary methods mimics the natural process of heat, pressure, and the presence of trace elements.

Solution Process (e.g., Hydrothermal Synthesis): This method mimics the natural process quickly and is less expensive. The gems are not as large as those made by Flame Fusion (the next method).

Flame Fusion or Melt Processes (e.g., the Verneuil Process or the Czochralski Process): This method can grow up to 4 inches of sapphire crystal per hour and is more expensive.

A third method utilizes a solution process through either (1) Flux Growth, where solid material is melted, and dissolved minerals from that melt form crystals as the solution cools, or (2) Hydrothermal Growth, used to make synthetic quartz. This process is expensive but also requires heat, pressure, and dissolved minerals in a watery solution to synthesize crystals.

The point is that sapphire can be made rapidly without long ages (e.g., an inch of sapphire per 15 minutes, for example). The Eifel research is a good confirmation that natural sapphire formation defies the long-age scenario in favor of recent, rapid synthesis, similar to what is done in the lab.

Though the Eifel researchers wouldn’t affirm a biblical timeline, as they still wanted to leave open a couple of million years (based on their worldview)[5], the research fits nicely into the biblical framework. Volcanic activity was prominent during the Flood and early post-Flood periods, especially during the rapid mountain-building phases. I would love for future researchers to study a recent, active volcano and take a closer look at the production of natural sapphire with rapid formation in mind.

---

[1] David Morris, History of the Sapphire Stone, September 4, 2023, davidmorris.com, https://davidmorris.com/history-of-the-sapphire-stone/.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Google AI, Asked on September 23, 2024.

[4] Tyler Hayden, The Splendor of Sapphires, Natural History Museum (L.A. County), accessed September 23, 2024, https://nhm.org/stories/splendor-sapphires.

[5] Stephanie Pappas Sapphires form inside the fiery hearts of volcanoes, not deep in the mantle like we thought, Live Science,  August 6, 2024, https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/geology/sapphires-form-inside-the-fiery-hearts-of-volcanoes-not-deep-in-the-mantle-like-we-thought.