Paul Seely wrote:
>Only by taking the "fountains of the great deep" out of their historical and
>biblical context could they be considered "ocean basins." Biblical scholars
>with the requisite training in languages and ancient Near Eastern studies
>universally agree that the fountains are TERRESTRIAL fountains drawing their
>water from the SUBTERRANEAN ocean which the Bible and other ancient Near
>Eastern literature understood to be beneath the earth (Pss 24:2; 136:6).
A clue to understanding precedes the flood account. Starting with Genesis
2:5-6: "And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every
herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to
rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. But there
went up a mist (fountain) from the earth, and watered the whole face of the
ground."
In the Septuagint, "fountain" appears rather than "mist" in the
KJV. Notice that puts the word in conjunction with "plant" and "field."
In Atrahasis we see the same connection. In the Atrahasis epic, the flood
follows a period of drought, the phrases "fountains of the deep" or
"fountain of the deep" appear four times. In all instances, fountain(s)
pertain to "fields," as in this example:
Be[low] the fountain of the deep was stopped, [that the
flood rose not at the source].
The field diminished [its fertility].
In other words, the irrigation system (fountains) that dried up in the
drought, overflowed during the flood. Just as Paul said, It has nothing to
do with "ocean basins" at all.
Dick Fischer - The Origins Solution - www.orisol.com
"The answer we should have known about 150 years ago"
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Feb 08 2002 - 19:33:26 EST