Thank you for such a thorough explanation of the basis for your belief in a flat earth. I am at a disadvantage because up until a month ago or so, I didn't even know that flat-earth believers existed. Therefore, I am not as knowledgeable in this area and am still picking things up as I go. I am having to do some research for my response, so bear with me if I take my time.
I was mistaken, it seems, that the Bible speaks of a sphere. You were correct in stating that there was no word in the Hebrew for such a shape. Therefore, either shape could be assumed.
"Wrong, there is only one shape that could be assumed : Flat Earth concept (i explained what it means several times)!"
“ The two beliefs (modern astronomy and Bible cosmology) cannot be held together in the same mind ; for he who thinks he believes both, has thought very little of either." Thomas Paine, "Age of Reason"."
Unlike most Christians, Bible-Scientists insist that if conventional science is true, the Bible must be false. Flat-earther John Hampden put it plainly: “No one can believe a single doctrine or dogma of modern astronomy, and accept Scriptures as divine revelation.”
The belief that the Earth is rotating on an "axis" and orbiting the sun is THE GRANDADDY OF ALL DECEPTIONS IN THE WORLD TODAY...
Launched from its modern founder's deathbed in 1543, the Copernican Revolution ushered in a movement that has totally reshaped and re-directed ALL of man's knowledge!
Over the centuries, superstars in the physical sciences established the Copernican model as an unchallenged fact. This success paved the way for conquest of the biological sciences (Darwin et al). This transvaluation of values and philosophy (Nietzsche et al) then quickly spread to the social and behavioral sciences (Marx, Freud et al), to mathematics (Einstein et al), the Arts (Picasso et al), Education (Dewey et al), and so on through today's media reinforcement of all of the above. ..As the 21st Century gets its feet wet, man's "knowledge" is almost totally secularized and the Bible all but ignored as the source of absolute Truth from God Himself. ..The "sciences" reign supreme, and they do so because of the victory of Copernicanism over the Bible's motionless earth.
21th century man may think that it is of no importance whatever whether the sun or the earth was proved to be the center of the universe. But it was then and it is now.
With the new world view, came doubt, the enemy of faith. As the famous English poet, John Donne, so aptly bemoaned: "And new philosophy calls all in doubt." Man, now displaced from the center of the universe, not only sustained a loss of dignity, purpose, and direction, but also he was most tragically and psychologically divorced from God, the all-unifying Creator. This is precisely why this controversy is crucial.
“He has fixed the earth firm, immovable.” (1 Chronicles 16:30)
“Thou hast fixed the earth immovable and firm …” (Psalm 93:1)
“Thou didst fix the earth on its foundation so that it never can be shaken.” (Psalm 104:5)
“…who made the earth and fashioned it, and himself fixed it fast…” (Isaiah 45:18)
“The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.” (Ecclesiastes 1:5)
Read more : http://www.energeticforum.com/258073-post180.html
While the Bible doesn’t flatly state the shape of the earth, it repeatedly says in plain Hebrew that the earth is immovable.
Had there been any way to prove that the Earth is submitted to any kind of motion, scientists would have supplied us with these proofs up until now, and by doing this they would have provided immortal fame for themselves.
Pretty sure this happened.
In a Scientific Lecture, delivered in 1878, at Berlin by Dr. Schcepper, proving that the Earth neither rotates nor revolves, he quoted the following still stronger protest of Gothe against the delusions of Modern Astronomy. " In whatever way or manner may have occurred this business, I must still say that I curse this modern theory of Cosmogony, and hope that perchance there may appear, in due time, some young scientist of genius, who will pick up courage enough to upset this universally disseminated delirium of lunatics."
Even the great astronomer Humboldt had a big difficulties with finding enough courage to admit the first truth (that the HC theory is a brazen lie) let alone to go the whole hog (and admit that the Earth is flat)!
Modern science texts to this day, dominated by secular humanists, state that Galileo proved the Copernican sun-centered theory. The fact is, he proved nothing. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), who sought to formulate the known facts about the universe into a uniform conception of nature in his Cosmos (5 Vols, 1845-1862), said quite candidly: "I have already known for a long time that we have no proof for the system of Copernicus . . .but I do not dare to be the first one to attack it."
I confess I do not understand how Humboldt could really have believed in the globularity of the world, when he penned the following passage, knowing, as a Cosmogonist, that water occupies, at the very lowest computation, at least three times the extent of the surface of the land "Among the causes which tend to lower the mean annual temperature, I include the following :—Elevation above the level of the sea, when not forming part of an extended plain."
" Cosmos," Vol. I., p. 326, Bohn's Edition.
THE GREAT THEOLOGIAN MARTIN LUTHER STATES:
"People gave ear to an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the sun and the moon. Whoever wishes to appear clever must devise some new system, which of all systems is of course the very best. This fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred Scripture tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth."
AND ACCORDING TO JOHN CALVIN:
"Those who assert that 'the earth moves and turns'...[are] motivated by 'a spirit of bitterness, contradiction, and faultfinding;' possessed by the devil, they aimed 'to pervert the order of nature.'"
The Bishop of Peterborough is another notable example. He says:
" I have no fear whatever, that the Bible will be found, In the long run, to contain more science than all the theories of philosophers put together."
My response is lengthy, so everyone's patience is appreciated for all the work that went into this (you made me do my homework! lol)
"Wrong, there is only one shape that could be assumed : Flat Earth concept (i explained what it means several times)!"
And I explained why the Bible does not speak specifically of a flat earth or a spherical earth. I do not see anything you have said that proves otherwise.
“ The two beliefs (modern astronomy and Bible cosmology) cannot be held together in the same mind ; for he who thinks he believes both, has thought very little of either."[/b][/color][/u]
Thomas Paine, "Age of Reason"."
Heliocentricism is not "modern astronomy." By 150 B.C., the Greek astronomer Eratosthenes had already measured the 25,000-mile circumference of the earth. More on this later.
As I stated previously, It is important to note that the same Hebrew word for ‘moved’ (môwt) in the same niphal stem is used in Psalm 16:8, ‘I shall not be moved’. Rather, the passage teaches that he would not stray from the path that God had set for him. If that’s so, then it’s impossible to deny that ‘the world … cannot be moved’ could mean that Earth will not stray from the precise orbital and rotational pattern God has set for it.
The Psalms are clearly poetic, not historical like Genesis.14 Thus, they were never intended to be used as a basis for a cosmological model. This can be shown by analyzing the context of Psalm 93:1: ‘The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.’
We should understand the terms as used by the biblical authors. Let’s read the next verse, ‘[God’s] throne is established of old,’ where the same word Hebrew כּוּן (kûn) is translated ‘established’ [i.e., stable, secure, enduring, not necessarily stationary, immobile].
Also, the same Hebrew word for ‘moved’ (מוֹט môt) is used in Psalm 16:8, ‘I shall not be moved.’ Surely, even skeptics wouldn’t accuse the Bible of teaching that the Psalmist was rooted to one spot! He meant that he would not stray from the path that God had set for him. So the earth ‘cannot be moved’ can also mean that it will not stray from the precise orbital and rotational pattern God has set for it. Life on earth requires that the earth’s orbit is at just the right distance from the sun for liquid water to exist. Also, that the earth’s rotational axis is at just the right angle from the ecliptic (orbital plane) so that temperature differences are not too extreme.
Joshua’s command to the sun to stand still does not support geocentrism. The Bible uses the language of appearance and observation.
Today people do exactly the same thing. For example, scientists who prepare weather reports for TV announce the times of ‘sunrise and sunset’. In fact, the mention of the moon also standing still seems to confirm both the divine authorship of the account and the fact that it is the Earth which moves.
Flat-earth belief was extremely rare in the Church. The flat earth’s two main proponents were obscure figures named Lactantius and Cosmas Indicopleustes (6th century). However, they were hugely outweighed by tens of thousands of Christian theologians, poets, artists, scientists, and rulers who unambiguously affirmed that the earth was round. There are accounts supporting earth’s sphericity from numerous medieval church scholars such as friar Roger Bacon, inventor of spectacles; leading medieval scientists such as John Buridan and Nicholas Oresme; the monk John of Sacrobosco who wrote Treatise on the Sphere, and many more.
One of the best-known proponents of a globe-shaped earth was the early English monk, theologian and historian, the Venerable Bede, who popularized the common BC/ AD dating system. Less well known was that he was also a leading astronomer of his day.
In his book On the Reckoning of Time (De temporum ratione), among other things he calculated the creation of the world to be in 3952 BC, showed how to calculate the date of Easter, and explicitly taught that the earth was round. From this, he showed why the length of days and nights changed with the seasons, and how tides were dragged by the moon. Bede was the first with this insight.
Here is what Bede said about the shape of the earth—round “like a ball” not “like a shield”:
“We call the earth a globe, not as if the shape of a sphere were expressed in the diversity of plains and mountains, but because, if all things are included in the outline, the earth’s circumference will represent the figure of a perfect globe. … For truly it is an orb placed in the centre of the universe; in its width it is like a circle, and not circular like a shield but rather like a ball, and it extends from its centre with perfect roundness on all sides.”
And the leading church theologian of the middle ages, Thomas Aquinas, wrote in his greatest work Summa Theologica/Theologiae:
“The physicist proves the earth to be round by one means, the astronomer by another: for the latter proves this by means of mathematics, e.g. by the shapes of eclipses, or something of the sort; while the former proves it by means of physics, e.g. by the movement of heavy bodies towards the centre, and so forth.”
The above demonstrate that Columbus was never opposed by flat earthers, simply because there were none to oppose him, among either church or political leaders. So what was the real issue?
Columbus was trying to reach India by sea, the ‘long way’ around the earth. But to do that, his ships had to carry enough provisions for the length of the journey. He had learned that the 9th-century Persian astronomer Alfraganus had estimated each degree of latitude spanned “56⅔ miles”. But Columbus thought Alfraganus meant the Roman mile (1,480 m, 4,856 ft), whereas he was using the Arabic mile (1,830 m, 6,004 ft). Thus Columbus thought that the earth’s circumference was only about ¾ of its actual length of about 40,000 km (25,000 miles). Columbus also greatly underestimated the distance between Japan and the Canary Islands as 3,000 Italian miles (3,700 km or 2,300 miles), whereas the distance by sea is more like 19,600 km (12,200 miles).
It was thus the size of the earth, not the shape, that was under dispute. His critics argued that ships of his day (1492) could not carry enough fresh water and food for such a huge journey. And they were right! Columbus was just lucky that an enormous continent was in the way.
An example of the misinformation in the ‘education’ system comes from the 20th-century high-school history textbook The American Pageant by Thomas Bailey. Many of its editions claimed, “The superstitious sailors [of Columbus’ crew] … grew increasingly mutinous … because they were fearful of sailing over the edge of the world.”
However, sailors were well aware of the shape of the earth. One myth states that people realized that the earth was round because they saw ships slowly sinking below the horizon. But before telescopes, it was more likely the other way round: sailors returning to land saw high mountains before lowlands.
Also, sailors from the northern hemisphere crossed the equator well before Christ, and reported that in the South, the sun shone from the north. They also knew how to measure their latitude from the angle of the sun at noon, which works only with a spherical earth.
The much-parroted flat-earth myth about him comes not from history but from the tales of Washington Irving, "The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus". Irving was probably America’s first genuine best-selling writer, but he admitted that he was “apt to indulge in the imagination.” Flat-earth belief was certainly a figment of his imagination.
It was bad enough that this myth entered the public perception thanks to Irving’s wide readership. But it became worse when it acquired the veneer of scholarship, so it could be used as a club with which to bash Christianity. The main propagandists for this cause were the notorious 19th century anti-Christian bigots John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White. Draper, a fine chemist and photographer—first president of the American Chemical Society—but a lousy historian, wrote History of the Conflict between Religion and Science as a poorly informed polemic against the Church. White was a disgruntled ex-Episcopalian and the founder of Cornell University as the first explicitly secular university in the United States. He also published the two-volume work History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom.
Both authors relied heavily on the work of Cosmas, portraying his flat-earth teaching as typical rather than the almost forgotten, extreme minority view that it was. And they are the ones most responsible for the discredited ‘conflict thesis’ between Christianity and science, instead of the real history that the Christian world-view was responsible for science in the first place, while it was still-born in other places like ancient Greece and China.
Colin Russell, Emeritus Professor of History of Science and Technology at the Open University, writes:
“Draper takes such liberty with history, perpetuating legends as fact that he is rightly avoided today in serious historical study. The same is nearly as true of White, though his prominent apparatus of prolific footnotes may create a misleading impression of meticulous scholarship.”
Both J.B. Russell and Gould argue that Draper and White had an agenda to discredit Christians who opposed the then-new theories of Darwin as ‘flat earthers’. Nothing much has changed!
The ancient Greeks well before Christ, had realized that the earth is a globe by observing lunar eclipses. They realized that at such times, the earth was between the moon and the sun, and it always cast a circular shadow, regardless of the direction, which proves that it’s a globe. For example, the famous philosopher Aristotle said:
“Either then the earth is spherical or it is at least naturally spherical. And it is right to call anything that which nature intends it to be, and which belongs to it, rather than which it is by constraint and contrary to nature. The evidence of the senses further corroborates this. How else would eclipses of the moon show segments shaped as we see them? As it is, the shapes which the moon itself each month shows are of every kind—straight, gibbous, and concave—but in eclipses the outline is always curved: and, since it is the interposition of the earth that makes the eclipse, the form of this line will be caused by the form of the earth’s surface, which is therefore spherical.”
If the Bible does not explicitly say that the earth is flat and/or still (different from immovable, as stated above), then it is unreasonable to assume that proofs of the earth's sphericity is a scam and a lie. Indeed the Bible itself speaks against conspiracy theory: Isaiah 8:12-13 says,
“Do not say, ‘A conspiracy,’ Concerning all that this people call a conspiracy, Nor be afraid of their threats, nor be troubled."