Re: craters (part of YEC defined)
Massie (mrlab@ix.netcom.com)
Sat, 13 Mar 1999 03:25:50 -0800
Allen Roy wrote:
>
> > From: PHSEELY@aol.com
> > This interpretation seems to be quite a stretch. It does not fit the
> > historical and biblical context.
>
> > In the Bible "the windows of heaven" are
> > sluices in the firmament above which is an ocean. When they are opened,
> the
> > ocean above pours down; and when they are closed the ocean above is
> dammed up
> > again by the solid firmament. In the biblical context asteroids would be
> > considered stars and would be embedded on the underside of the firmament,
> not
> > above it in back of the sluices; so sluices would not have to be opened
> to
> > have them fall to earth.
>
> Talk of a stretch! Whew! Firmament (KJV; expanse NIV) comes from the
> word riqiya` which, according to Strong, means 'expanse'. How riqiya` is
> used in the Bible determines its meaning. In verse 20 the birds "fly in
> the open 'riqiya`' of heaven." How can birds fly in a solid shell? The
> most obvious solution is that those who wrote the Bible did not concieve of
> a solid shell to hold the stars. It is true that other societies of the
> time believed such sillyness, but that does not mean that the believers in
> God held that position too.
>
> The description of the dividing of the waters by the expanse in verses 6
> and 7 does not define in which state (solid, liquid or vapor) were the
> waters above. How is it that you know that it was liquid (oceans)? Just
> because the waters below were liquid does not mean that those above were
> the same.
>
> Since asteroids are invisible to the naked eye, they would not have been
> known to the ancients. Your inclusion of them with the stars in the shell
> is your own interpretation, not theirs nor the Bible's.
>
> I am not saying that the ancients, nor the writer of Genesis 7 and 8, knew
> about asteroids, but that the choice of the word 'arubba' under the
> inspiriation of the Holy Spirit is most interesting in that it's root has
> the meaning of to lurk or to lie in ambush. It seems like the Holy Spirit
> is saying to us who have now learned of asteroids, 'See, I know all about
> the universe, and have placed these clues for you to discover and believe.'
>
>
> Allen
They could not see the asteroids but they could see the coments so they
had some idea of this.
The shepards had no concept of cause and effect or scientific law and we
don't know what if any ideas of cosmology they had. So we have
speculation upon speculation and so lets debate one speculation against
another. How about the concept that we cannot clearly and without doubt
from the Hebrew determine exactly what this meant and that perhaps the
Hebrew and the writers where not that specific either. Bert Massie