"At least this geocentrist guy is consistent enough to take his Biblicism to
its logical end ..."
If this geocentrist really hopes to use the two passages as his proof-texts,
he is indeed on shaky ground, theologically at least...despite the rather
stellar commentators he quoted.
Using Eccl 1:5 would imply that anyone using the terms "sunrise" or
"sunset," including most almanacs editors, TV weathermen, and, I dare say,
astronomers, must be a geocentrist at heart. That would be a hard
contention to support.
Joshua 10 lends more creditability, not because it says the sun, and
possibly the moon, stood still for "about a day." (As with Genesis 1, how is
a day defined? Did they have hour-glasses back then?)
One can not just say that the writer should have said "the earth stood
still"; If the angular velocity of the earth decelerated to zero that
quick, things would become much more exciting than just Joshua conquering
yet another pagan tribe. If that doesn't seem exciting enough, consider the
effects produced by the earth spinning backwards. (Isaiah 38:8).
The inspired writers obviously reported the miracles at face value, which
needs no aberrant celestial behavior in either case. It is well known that
atmospheric conditions can cause apparent shifts in position of far away
objects, causing a phenomenon called a "mirage." With a sufficient amount
of "Divine Intervention," (sorry, any deists out there), these bodies could
seem to stand still, or retrograde, over a significant length of time.
While I would be the last to encourage the teaching that miracles could be
the result of "lights and mirrors," I would suggest that the phenomena cited
is much more likely the result of form than substance.
Norm
-----Original Message-----
From: SteamDoc@aol.com [mailto:SteamDoc@aol.com]
Sent: Friday, March 15, 2002 7:55 PM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: ASA Perspective
In a message dated 3/15/02 1:17:52 PM Mountain Standard Time,
Norm.Woodward@robins.af.mil writes:
Allan Harvey, steamdoc@aol.com wrote:
<snip>
There is only a problem if one insists that Biblical "infallibility"
applies not only to the traditional "matters of faith and practice" but also
to scientific questions outside the purpose of Scripture. Of course some
people do that. Such people were in trouble long before Darwin, since if
read that way the Bible teaches that the mustard seed is the smallest of all
seeds, that the Sun revolves around the Earth, and that the waters above the
Earth are held back by a solid dome.
________________
Out of curiosity, where in the bible does it say "....that the Sun revolves
around the Earth..."?
For starters, see the Biblical arguments on this Webpage:
http://www.geocentricity.com/whygeocentricity.htm
Of course reasonable people would say that these arguments are mistaken,
that these passages are not about astronomy and that God was communicating
in a way appropriate to the conceptual framework of the inspired writers
and original prescientific audience.
But when some of us make similar observations about forced scientific
readings of Genesis 1, many of those reasonable people view that as making
Scripture "weak" (or as selling out the Bible completely).
At least this geocentrist guy is consistent enough to take his Biblicism to
its logical end ...
Allan
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Allan H. Harvey, Boulder, Colorado | SteamDoc@aol.com
"Any opinions expressed here are mine, and should not be
attributed to my employer, my wife, or my cats"
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