# Which is central, the Sun or the Earth?



## JennyG

I'm interested to know what everyone thinks, because besides being a fascinating subject in itself, this seems to me to be of serious cultural and spiritual importance. The universal mental picture of Earth as peripheral and insignificant, one of the obscurest among a myriad inhabited planets, must have done more to undermine the Biblical world-view than almost anything else except biological evolution (to which it's closely related). 

This isn't intended as a question for scientists, and I don't mean to start a technical discussion of the scientific evidence for or against. As a non-scientist, I have to approach it differently.

My starting point is just the fact that there IS scientific evidence for geocentricity. Who even knew that?? It seems to be a remarkably well-kept secret as far as the average layman is concerned. 
I have only now discovered (for eg) that for the purpose of predicting eclipses and so on, the geocentric model and the heliocentric fit equally well with observational evidence. It's just that this fact gets no publicity: not surprisingly when for any serious astronomer to suggest that the evidence points to geocentricity would mean the instant loss of all academic credibility (it's exactly the same with Young Earth Creationism). There are many who do think so, but their views are not going to make headlines any time soon. 

However (this is the crux) if there is "good enough" scientific support for both positions without demonstrable consensus, - shouldn't Christians be looking to the Bible to tell us which is the true model? 
- and surely Scripture on balance asserts geocentricity much more unambiguously than it could possibly be said to assert the contrary. 
Besides, Earth is undeniably the spiritual centre of all things, so failing extraordinarily conclusive counter-evidence, one would naturally expect it also to be physically central (as is in fact powerfully implied in the account of Creation week). 
Finally, as soon as I question how come in that case heliocentricity could have gained universal credence - I know the answer.


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## CharlieJ

JennyG said:


> I'm interested to know what everyone thinks, because besides being a fascinating subject in itself, this seems to me to be of serious cultural and spiritual importance. The universal mental picture of Earth as peripheral and insignificant, one of the obscurest among a myriad inhabited planets, must have done more to undermine the Biblical world-view than almost anything else except biological evolution (to which it's closely related).
> 
> This isn't intended as a question for scientists, and I don't mean to start a technical discussion of the scientific evidence for or against. As a non-scientist, I have to approach it differently.
> 
> My starting point is just the fact that there IS scientific evidence for geocentricity. Who even knew that?? It seems to be a remarkably well-kept secret as far as the average layman is concerned.
> I have only now discovered (for eg) that for the purpose of predicting eclipses and so on, the geocentric model and the heliocentric fit equally well with observational evidence. It's just that this fact gets no publicity: not surprisingly when for any serious astronomer to suggest that the evidence points to geocentricity would mean the instant loss of all academic credibility (it's exactly the same with Young Earth Creationism). There are many who do think so, but their views are not going to make headlines any time soon.
> 
> However (this is the crux) if there is "good enough" scientific support for both positions without demonstrable consensus, - shouldn't Christians be looking to the Bible to tell us which is the true model?
> - and surely Scripture on balance asserts geocentricity much more unambiguously than it could possibly be said to assert the contrary.
> Besides, Earth is undeniably the spiritual centre of all things, so failing extraordinarily conclusive counter-evidence, one would naturally expect it also to be physically central (as is in fact powerfully implied in the account of Creation week).
> Finally, as soon as I question how come in that case heliocentricity could have gained universal credence - I know the answer.



I just want to point out that whatever answer you give in regard to the solar system, you also have to think of the position of our solar system within the universe.


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## JennyG

Sure - same answer, basically, I think!


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## Edward

I'd say 'neither'. God is central. 



> The universal mental picture of Earth as peripheral and insignificant,


. 

Such as mental picture leads to good theology, not bad. The error most modern men hold is not that they are insignificant in comparison with God and his creation, but that they are important and the universe rotates around them, not its creator.


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## rbcbob

Genesis 1:16 Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also.

Notice this geocentric bias or perspective in the creation narrative. Though dwarfed by stars the earth and moon are given top billing in this account. The stars are almost an after-thought from the narrator’s point of view.

EJ Young brings this out beautifully in his IN THE BEGINNING commentary on Genesis 1-3.

We say the sky is up; "up" from what? From our terrestrial space-time view.


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## JennyG

Edward said:


> I'd say 'neither'. God is central.


God is central of course....but not in a physical sense.


> The universal mental picture of Earth as peripheral and insignificant,
> 
> 
> 
> .
> 
> Such as mental picture leads to good theology, not bad. The error most modern men hold is not that they are insignificant in comparison with God and his creation, but that they are important and the universe rotates around them, not its creator.
Click to expand...

I think that's a slightly misleading way of putting it.
If modern men see the earth as (physically) peripheral, what that leads to in practice is the inference that God's purposes, which as the scriptures make plain centre upon it, are discounted. That's different from the egoism of the individual soul which sees itself (not literally) as the centre of the universe


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## Mushroom

Motion is relative to the observer. The Earth is the center for those of us who are observing the stars from Earth. For the rest of the space cadets, it's wherever they happen to be standing at the moment.

Heliocentricity is only useful to those trying to track movement in the relatively small group of heavenly bodies called the Solar System.


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## VaughanRSmith

The Bible doesn't offer a specific cosmological scheme (in the way that it does for creation, etc.), and to argue that it does opens you up to some pretty odd things. It's ok to be a 6-day creationist and still believe in literary genres and metaphors, in my opinion.


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## Skyler

JennyG said:


> However (this is the crux) if there is "good enough" scientific support for both positions without demonstrable consensus, - shouldn't Christians be looking to the Bible to tell us which is the true model?
> - and surely Scripture on balance asserts geocentricity much more unambiguously than it could possibly be said to assert the contrary.
> Besides, Earth is undeniably the spiritual centre of all things, so failing extraordinarily conclusive counter-evidence, one would naturally expect it also to be physically central (as is in fact powerfully implied in the account of Creation week).
> Finally, as soon as I question how come in that case heliocentricity could have gained universal credence - I know the answer.



1. What do you mean by "central"? The average (or instantaneous?) center of mass of the solar system? The point about which the objects of the solar system rotate? The most important part of the solar system?

If the latter, then it certainly depends upon the context of the discussion. From a physics/cosmological perspective, the sun is the most massive and therefore the most important part of the solar system. Without it, the planets wouldn't be in the ordered structure that they are. From a theological perspective, on the other hand, God's redemptive plan is centered on Earth.

Mathematically, if I'm not mistaken, the heliocentric theory is simpler than the geocentric theory. While both "work", the simpler of the two is clearly the more desirable, per Occam's Razor.

On another note, I read a wildly speculative Scientific American article which was trying to get away from the fact that the Earth seemed to be central to the universe. I'm still not sure why. 

edit: I almost forgot. The Bible isn't a science book, so it doesn't usually help to use it like one.


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## OPC'n

No, I don't think that God meant for us to perceive the earth as being central. Most of the time God speaks in a language in which we can understand and relate. For God to speak to us using examples of a distant galaxy which we are not even aware of would be counteractive to our learn. He brings lessons down to our understandable level. That doesn't make it wrong but it doesn't make science either. For example, God states in the Bible that the sun rises and sets. He states it this way for our (or more to the point those ppl before us) understanding. We can actually see the sun setting or rising. Is it wrong to say this? No, but does it confirm what science really is? No. We know that the earth rotates and that's what makes the sun look like it is setting or rising. So just bc God speaks in a way which seems to confirm geocentricity does not mean that it is. It only means that God is speaking to us "where we are". God speaks about the earth with more emphasis bc this is where His ppl live.....we don't live on the sun. Our galaxy could be the centralized galaxy no one on this side of heaven will ever know. But certainly the earth is not centralized. The earth along with the other planets revolve around the sun not the other way around.


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## toddpedlar

The Earth orbits the sun. 

Sorry folks.

And it has NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING to do with its significance.


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## Montanablue

I thought this thread was a joke. Then I read it.

Oh dear.

Reactions: Funny 1


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## JennyG

toddpedlar said:


> The Earth orbits the sun.
> 
> Sorry folks.


but why would someone like me believe that?
I look up, and I see all the heavenly bodies go round. Nothing in God's word contradicts that impression. Rather, it tends to confirm it.
I had a good education, but it included very little science so I'm forced to go by authority where scientific subjects are concerned.
You say the Earth goes round the sun, but a Bible-believing astronomer like Gerhardus Bouw says not. He's as well qualified to judge as the next astronomer, plus it's blindingly obvious why he doesn't get general agreement.
I use Scripture to decide, and conclude that when Joshua told the sun, not the earth, to stand still, that was what he meant!

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 03:26:08 EST-----



Montanablue said:


> I thought this thread was a joke. Then I read it.
> 
> Oh dear.



I set out my logical steps as clearly as I could....can you explain which one is "oh dear" ?!


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## Montanablue

JennyG said:


> toddpedlar said:
> 
> 
> 
> The Earth orbits the sun.
> 
> Sorry folks.
> 
> 
> 
> but why would someone like me believe that?
> I look up, and I see all the heavenly bodies go round. Nothing in God's word contradicts that impression. Rather, it tends to confirm it.
> I had a good education, but it included very little science so I'm forced to go by authority where scientific subjects are concerned.
> You say the Earth goes round the sun, but a Bible-believing astronomer like Gerhardus Bouw says not. He's as well qualified to judge as the next astronomer, plus it's blindingly obvious why he doesn't get general agreement.
> I use Scripture to decide, and conclude that when Joshua told the sun, not the earth, to stand still, that was what he meant!
Click to expand...


Jenny, you say that you are not well educated in science. Fair enough, but when it comes to a question like this, you really ought to educate yourself before making assertions. If not, you'll simply repeat the errors that the Roman Church made in the early 1600s. I don't think any Reformed teachers would say that we are meant to take everything in the Bible absolutely literally - some things are metaphors. For instance, in Psalm 8 there is a reference to the "paths of the sea" (in vs. 3, I think?). Obviously, this doesn't mean that there are literal walking paths through the sea. The psalmist is referencing currents. 

I would encourage you to read the the history of the Catholic church's suppression of heliocentrism - it may be easier to see the problems with an absolutely literal interpretation of all scripture if you read it in a historic perspective. Perhaps others could recommend some books or readings on how we interpret the Bible - knowing that it is all God-inspired, but also recognizing that there are metaphors, poetic language etc.

I don't say this to be mean, so please don't take it that way. I'm just concerned that your rejection of heliocentrism based on a few Bible veses may point to a larger issue with the way that you read Scripture.


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## toddpedlar

JennyG said:


> toddpedlar said:
> 
> 
> 
> The Earth orbits the sun.
> 
> Sorry folks.
> 
> 
> 
> but why would someone like me believe that?
> I look up, and I see all the heavenly bodies go round. Nothing in God's word contradicts that impression. Rather, it tends to confirm it.
> I had a good education, but it included very little science so I'm forced to go by authority where scientific subjects are concerned.
Click to expand...


Was Julius Caesar actually a real person?

Will the drug that the doctor prescribes for your stomach pain relieve your symptoms?

We have to take a lot of stuff on authority. If you don't want to, then that's fine. Don't. Be willfully ignorant, if that is what you wish to do. But don't disdain taking things on authority - since you are doing just that with Mr. Bouw's opinions. You are just as guilty of taking his word as anyone else is who happens to take mine, or that of any other scientist. 



> You say the Earth goes round the sun, but a Bible-believing astronomer like Gerhardus Bouw says not. He's as well qualified to judge as the next astronomer, plus it's blindingly obvious why he doesn't get general agreement.



I as a Bible-believing physicist say that Bouw is wrong. He is misunderstanding Scripture in that Scripture writes from the point of view of man. Scripture does NOT demand that the Sun orbits the earth, despite what woodenly-literal readers want to make it say.

Does Bouw believe the Earth is flat and has four corners? If not, why not? 

Does he believe that God has wings, and arms, and fingers? 

Does he believe that Jesus Christ is a wooden door? 

Despite what Bouw says there is NO scientific evidence that the Sun orbits the Earth. It just isn't there. The evidence that the Earth orbits the sun is so overwhelming as to be totally unquestionable. The byzantine and frankly ridiculous things that would have to occur for a geocentric model of the solar system to work out - the things that have to be explained away are far more than one could ever hope to explain. The simple matter of the fact is that the Earth orbits the Sun, as do all the other planets. There is no scientific or Biblical reason to insist on geocentrism. By stridently taking the position he does, Bouw is the kind of "scientist" that brings unnecessary reproach to Christians who are scientists. The reason he does not garner broad agreement is because he is flat out wrong. The evidence cannot support his 'scientific conclusions'.



> I use Scripture to decide, and conclude that when Joshua told the sun, not the earth, to stand still, that was what he meant!



That's fine. Take it as you will and ignore the clear evidence that denies the geocentric concept. The fact that the Sun appears to move in the sky does not mean it actually is moving around the Earth. You speak as though your "using Scripture to decide" is something that I am not doing. That is totally offensive. You are making accusations that I don't think you truly wish to make if you think about it. 

What you are doing is not "using Scripture to decide" but using Scripture inappropriately. You are forcing Scripture to do something it isn't meant to do. It is sufficient to teach what it is meant to teach - it is NOT sufficient to teach what it is NOT attempting to teach. Just because Joshua told the sun to stand still and it did does not mean that the way it occurred was for God to stop it from moving. Whatever occurred at that point was a miraculous work of God and how it occurred is irrelevant. Whether God stopped the Sun moving about the Earth or whether God stopped the Earth spinning on its axis - or in some other way suspended the normal operation of things - is totally irrelevant. God did it. It is recorded to have happened. We believe it because Scripture is an infallible record of the truth. However, it is also written from the perspective of men. 

Joshua had no clue about the real workings of the universe - and had no clue about the reason the Sun appears to move in the sky. However, he spoke as he understood things - and wanted the day to last longer - so he commanded the sun and moon to stand still. God honored that prayer by causing them to, in effect, stand still. How he did it was beyond Joshua's understanding. However, he honored that, and made what Joshua wanted to occur come to pass. 

The fact that the Earth orbits the sun belies NONE of this. It does not shake our confidence in Scripture, nor does it negate ANYTHING that Scripture teaches. We MUST read Scripture as Scripture is written, by whom it was written, and in terms of what it is to teach - that God almighty made this miraculous thing happen.

Reactions: Informative 1


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## TimV

Very nice post, Todd.


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## jwithnell

Wasn't the geocentric view largely expounded by Aristotle, then enforced as truth by the Roman church in the middle ages?


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## Montanablue

jwithnell said:


> Wasn't the geocentric view largely expounded by Aristotle, then enforced as truth by the Roman church in the middle ages?



Yes. The idea of a geocentric earth actually originated from the Greek philosophers - Aristotle and Ptolemy particularly. The Roman Church latched onto the idea and in typical style decided to persecute anyone that disagreed with them. Chinese philosophers also embraced geocentrism. (Who knew that mandatory world history class would ever come in handy!)


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## py3ak

toddpedlar said:


> Was Julius Caesar actually a real person?
> 
> Will the drug that the doctor prescribes for your stomach pain relieve your symptoms?
> 
> We have to take a lot of stuff on authority. If you don't want to, then that's fine. Don't. Be willfully ignorant, if that is what you wish to do. But don't disdain taking things on authority - since you are doing just that with Mr. Bouw's opinions. You are just as guilty of taking his word as anyone else is who happens to take mine, or that of any other scientist.



Todd, I think you're misreading Jenny here. She is acknowledging that not having the scientific expertise to figure it out for herself, she, like most of us, is accepting authority. So she can't be condemned for inconsistency in that regard. The authority who's convinced her happens to disagree with you and yours, but that's no reason to make accusations of wilful ignorance, etc.

[Moderator]*Ladies and Gentlemen, it would be very sad if we couldn't civilly discuss an issue of the relationship of science and Scripture. If you can't write without acting as though the other side is insane or deliberately unfaithful to Scripture, please refrain from posting altogether.*[/Moderator]


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## JennyG

jwithnell said:


> Wasn't the geocentric view largely expounded by Aristotle, then enforced as truth by the Roman church in the middle ages?


I don't think that was quite it, but I would have to look it up. All that stuff about Galileo is less straightforward than it seems.
Dear me, I seem to have put my foot in it somewhat.
Todd, did you really feel I was offensive? 
It was the last thing I would ever have intended, so please forgive me if so. 
I can't reply properly now though, I have an early start tomorrow.
Hope some more people may have thoughts to contribute while I'm asleep.
Will any one dare agree though....?

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 04:10:56 EST-----



py3ak said:


> toddpedlar said:
> 
> 
> 
> Was Julius Caesar actually a real person?
> 
> Will the drug that the doctor prescribes for your stomach pain relieve your symptoms?
> 
> We have to take a lot of stuff on authority. If you don't want to, then that's fine. Don't. Be willfully ignorant, if that is what you wish to do. But don't disdain taking things on authority - since you are doing just that with Mr. Bouw's opinions. You are just as guilty of taking his word as anyone else is who happens to take mine, or that of any other scientist.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Todd, I think you're misreading Jenny here. She is acknowledging that not having the scientific expertise to figure it out for herself, she, like most of us, is accepting authority. So she can't be condemned for inconsistency in that regard. The authority who's convinced her happens to disagree with you and yours, but that's no reason to make accusations of wilful ignorance, etc.
> 
> [Moderator]*Ladies and Gentlemen, it would be very sad if we couldn't civilly discuss an issue of the relationship of science and Scripture. If you can't write without acting as though the other side is insane or deliberately unfaithful to Scripture, please refrain from posting altogether.*[/Moderator]
Click to expand...

Thanks, Ruben!
That's what I was going to try saying tomorrow. Goodnight, God bless, thank you


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## Skyler

Montanablue said:


> jwithnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> Wasn't the geocentric view largely expounded by Aristotle, then enforced as truth by the Roman church in the middle ages?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes. The idea of a geocentric earth actually originated from the Greek philosophers - Aristotle and Ptolemy particularly. The Roman Church latched onto the idea and in typical style decided to persecute anyone that disagreed with them. Chinese philosophers also embraced geocentrism. (Who knew that mandatory world history class would ever come in handy!)
Click to expand...


I learned that much from reading Wikipedia on the subject.


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## Montanablue

Skyler said:


> Montanablue said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> jwithnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> Wasn't the geocentric view largely expounded by Aristotle, then enforced as truth by the Roman church in the middle ages?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes. The idea of a geocentric earth actually originated from the Greek philosophers - Aristotle and Ptolemy particularly. The Roman Church latched onto the idea and in typical style decided to persecute anyone that disagreed with them. Chinese philosophers also embraced geocentrism. (Who knew that mandatory world history class would ever come in handy!)
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> I learned that much from reading Wikipedia on the subject.
Click to expand...


Oh. Guess it was a waste of credit hours after all.


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## TimV

Rueben, what if the authority who convinced her isn't an authority? Is this one of those subjects that everyone's opinion counts equally? "I think the government brought down the two towers" " I think the world will end as we know it because of Y2K" "I think that the Septuagint is a myth" "I think that Saddam used WMD on US troops" " I think that unicorns exist".

Isn't there a case for systematic, logical thinking in Christendom?


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## Skyler

"Dr. Gerardus D. Bouw also accepts the King James Bible as the inspired word of God for the English-speaking people." http://creationwiki.org/Gerardus_Bouw

Ooohhh.... that explains it. 

(no offense KJVO's. )

He does seem to have a PhD in astronomy from Case Western, so that might count for something.


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## lynnie

There is an entire association of geocentric astronomers and physicists world wide, including PhDs at Universities, and I am not sure they are all Christians either. Some, as with Intelligent Design, start with observation and not the bible. This is not as simple to brush off as Todd implies.

First of all both models work for predictions such as retrograde motion of planets, ecclipses, etc. The geocentric one has the other planets orbiting sun, and all that goes around the earth. Yes the helio is simpler, but simple does not mean right. 

The main thing that geocentrists center on is the Michaelson-Morley experiments. When we measure waves in the electromagnetic spectrum such as radar waves for example, if we move towards the source or away from the source we either subtract or add our velocity to measure the speed of the wave. With sound waves (not in the EM spectrum) you experience this as the ambulance siren sounding higher or lower as it speeds to and from you. With radar you can figure out if the attack submarine is coming towwards you or away from you.


Now lots of EM waves are measured this way- radio, X-rays, etc. Velocities are added and subtracted when the observer is moving. If you want Occam's razor simple, this is simple.

So, scientists did these very clever set ups to record the light coming from a distant star. During half the year we are supposedly hurling towards the star as we orbit the sun, and the other half of the year we are moving away from the star. So measure the difference of the speed of the light in each direction to figure out the speed of rotation.

One problem- they kept getting a zero value. The earth was not moving. They did this again (I think Sagnac was the other experimenter) and the earth's speed always comes out zero. This was a big problem and even the secular textbooks will freely admit what a huge problem it was. 

Along came Einstein the alleged great genius who asked us to lay aside Occam's simple razor, and the known laws of physics applying to the electromagnetic spectrum, and realize that visible light will measure the same to any observer whether you are speeding towards it, away, or standing still. And thus heliocentricity was saved.

I am no astronomer or physicist, but I have read enough by those who are, men of top level education and brains, to know that there is a strong scientific community that rejects both Einstein's theory of relativity and heliocentricity and they have plenty of fine math and physics backing them up. This isn't just one maverick guy saying this. 

They cover everything you might be thinking of like the focault pendulum, satellites, the speed of the sun and stars daily around the earth ( the stars are nowhere as far away as you have been told) and all kinds of stuff. 

I'll go on record as saying that all this exegesis about how God said things to accommodate our perspective seems stretched to me. And certainly not simple.


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## MW

I can allow that science might work with a variety of models and it would be unscientific to be dogmatic on a point for which there can only be limited evidence and experimentation. OTOH, the Bible provides one, and only one model, and that is the geocentric model, and the Bible is true in all it says. "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God."


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## Skyler

lynnie said:


> The main thing that geocentrists center on is the Michaelson-Morley experiments. When we measure waves in the electromagnetic spectrum such as radar waves for example, if we move towards the source or away from the source we either subtract or add our velocity to measure the speed of the wave. With sound waves (not in the EM spectrum) you experience this as the ambulance siren sounding higher or lower as it speeds to and from you. With radar you can figure out if the attack submarine is coming towwards you or away from you.



#1: The Doppler effect is a shift in the _frequency_ of the radiation, which is different than its _velocity_.



> So, scientists did these very clever set ups to record the light coming from a distant star. During half the year we are supposedly hurling towards the star as we orbit the sun, and the other half of the year we are moving away from the star. So measure the difference of the speed of the light in each direction to figure out the speed of rotation.
> 
> One problem- they kept getting a zero value. The earth was not moving. They did this again (I think Sagnac was the other experimenter) and the earth's speed always comes out zero. This was a big problem and even the secular textbooks will freely admit what a huge problem it was.
> 
> Along came Einstein the alleged great genius who asked us to lay aside Occam's simple razor, and the known laws of physics applying to the electromagnetic spectrum, and realize that visible light will measure the same to any observer whether you are speeding towards it, away, or standing still. And thus heliocentricity was saved.



#2: The Michelson-Morley experiment was set up to detect the presence of a luminiferous aether--and it failed, miserably. It doesn't have to do with measuring the speed of light coming from a distant star, but the speed of the hypothetical aether wind caused by the Earth moving through the aether at high velocities. See the Wikipedia page here: Michelson?Morley experiment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 05:31:17 EST-----



armourbearer said:


> I can allow that science might work with a variety of models and it would be unscientific to be dogmatic on a point for which there can only be limited evidence and experimentation. OTOH, the Bible provides one, and only one model, and that is the geocentric model, and the Bible is true in all it says. "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God."



But the Bible doesn't explicitly provide a geocentric model; it's implicitly derived from linguistic expressions. Like I've said before, the Bible isn't a science textbook, intended to provide us with a model of the universe. We shouldn't treat it as such.

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 05:33:17 EST-----



lynnie said:


> I am no astronomer or physicist, but I have read enough by those who are, men of top level education and brains, to know that there is a strong scientific community that rejects both Einstein's theory of relativity and heliocentricity and they have plenty of fine math and physics backing them up. This isn't just one maverick guy saying this.



The same argument can--and has been--made about evolutionary biology/cosmology. It's a weak argument at best.


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## MW

Skyler said:


> But the Bible doesn't explicitly provide a geocentric model; it's implicitly derived from linguistic expressions. Like I've said before, the Bible isn't a science textbook, intended to provide us with a model of the universe. We shouldn't treat it as such.



Fascinating how quickly scientific questions can turn people into Bible experts. The miracle in Joshua is not a linguistic expression. The sun stood still. It is history!


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## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> But the Bible doesn't explicitly provide a geocentric model; it's implicitly derived from linguistic expressions. Like I've said before, the Bible isn't a science textbook, intended to provide us with a model of the universe. We shouldn't treat it as such.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Fascinating how quickly scientific questions can turn people into Bible experts. The miracle in Joshua is not a linguistic expression. The sun stood still. It is history!
Click to expand...


Well, think about it. If the Bible had said "The earth stood still", how impressive would that be? 

The point of the Bible was not to provide a cosmological model on a 21st-century level. It was to explain God's power, and it does so in such a way that it's understandable both to cultures with a geocentric cosmology and a heliocentric one. Saying "The sun stood still" gives a dramatic picture of what went on that is immediately and intuitively understandable by everyone, regardless of their level of scientific knowledge.


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## Philip

For the geocentrists:

I'm curious as to what you make of such things as the Hubble telescope, space missions, and other such things. It just seems to me that Biblical geocentrism, like the Biblical case for a flat earth, is rooted in a hermaneutic that may not be justified.

For example, if I, a heliocentrist, say that watched a sunset with someone, does it follow from that that I mean that I saw the sun move? No, it just means that I'm describing the way things _appear_.


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## MW

Skyler said:


> Saying "The sun stood still" gives a dramatic picture of what went on that is immediately and intuitively understandable by everyone, regardless of their level of scientific knowledge.



A part of the miracle was the fact that the sun obeyed the voice of man. The voice of man told the sun to stand still. That is part and parcel of the miracle. You are not at liberty to thrust an allegorical interpretation on the passage.


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## py3ak

TimV said:


> Rueben, what if the authority who convinced her isn't an authority? Is this one of those subjects that everyone's opinion counts equally? "I think the government brought down the two towers" " I think the world will end as we know it because of Y2K" "I think that the Septuagint is a myth" "I think that Saddam used WMD on US troops" " I think that unicorns exist".
> 
> Isn't there a case for systematic, logical thinking in Christendom?



Tim, obviously not all authorities are created equal; but in the absence of a presentation of actual evidence, simply saying "my authority is better than yours" is extremely unconvincing. Until you've reached the stage where an authority has been established as trustworthy one can't just appeal to that authority and leave the matter there.


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## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> Saying "The sun stood still" gives a dramatic picture of what went on that is immediately and intuitively understandable by everyone, regardless of their level of scientific knowledge.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A part of the miracle was the fact that the sun obeyed the voice of man. The voice of man told the sun to stand still. That is part and parcel of the miracle. You are not at liberty to thrust an allegorical interpretation on the passage.
Click to expand...


And anyone who was there, whether they had a geocentric or heliocentric cosmology, would agree that the sun stood still. But that doesn't mean we know the exact mechanics of the miracle--only the symptoms. That being, the "sun stood still and the moon stayed".

P.S. Sorry, I have a bad habit of posting the first thing that comes to mind and then editing it almost as soon as I post it.


----------



## lynnie

Skyler: This was the Time Magazine Man of the Century, cover story.

_TIME 100: Person of the Century - A Brief History of Relativity

*You would expect light to travel at a fixed speed through the ether. So if you were traveling in the same direction as the light, you would expect that its speed would appear to be lower, and if you were traveling in the opposite direction to the light, that its speed would appear to be higher. Yet a series of experiments failed to find any evidence for differences in speed due to motion through the ether. *

*The most careful and accurate of these experiments was carried out by Albert Michelson and Edward Morley at the Case Institute in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1887. They compared the speed of light in two beams at right angles to each other. As the earth rotates on its axis and orbits the sun, they reasoned, it will move through the ether, and the speed of light in these two beams should diverge. But Michelson and Morley found no daily or yearly differences between the two beams of light. It was as if light always traveled at the same speed relative to you, no matter how you were moving.* ( lynnie edit- it was as if the earth stood still)

But it was a young clerk named Albert Einstein, working in the Swiss Patent Office in Bern, who cut through the ether and solved the speed-of-light problem once and for all. In June 1905 he wrote one of three papers that would establish him as one of the world's leading scientists — and in the process start two conceptual revolutions that changed our understanding of time, space and reality. 

In that 1905 paper, Einstein pointed out that because you could not detect whether or not you were moving through the ether, the whole notion of an ether was redundant. Instead, Einstein started from the postulate that the laws of science should appear the same to all freely moving observers.* In particular, observers should all measure the same speed for light, no matter how they were moving. *_

************
I don't want to waste time arguing, and anybody who wants to pursue this further can just google it. There are web sites out there, and books and videos. Michaelson- Morley and others (Sagnac If I recall correctly) show that the earth is still, unless you adopt Einstein. I may not be the brightest lightbulb in the PB chandelier, but I read enough geocentric materials a long time ago to know that heliocentricity is impossible unless you adopt relativity theory. I choose to believe that visible light behaves exactly the same way every other wave on the electromagnetic spectrum behaves, with adding and subtracting velocities of observers and sources. I read plenty of Einstein debunking back in the day (much of the physics way over my head, but the basics were understandable). Ultimately both models work and neither can be "proven".


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> And anyone who was there, whether they had a geocentric or heliocentric cosmology, would agree that the sun stood still. But that doesn't mean we know the exact mechanics of the miracle--only the symptoms. That being, the "sun stood still and the moon stayed".



I hope you are not suggesting that the Bible merely accommodated its language to the misconception of the one/s telling or reading the account. This is a liberal view of accommodation.


----------



## Zenas

Geocentricity is untenable and is neither necessarily nor possibly deduced from Scripture. God's Word is not a science book. He wrote it to convey to us specific things, i.e. special revelation. Everything else is general revelation. Heliocentricity is deduced from general revelation.


----------



## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> And anyone who was there, whether they had a geocentric or heliocentric cosmology, would agree that the sun stood still. But that doesn't mean we know the exact mechanics of the miracle--only the symptoms. That being, the "sun stood still and the moon stayed".
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I hope you are not suggesting that the Bible merely accommodated its language to the misconception of the one/s telling or reading the account. This is a liberal view of accommodation.
Click to expand...


Not at all. I'm saying that if I (a heliocentrist) was there, I would have said "Hey look! The sun's standing still!" That the earth was actually the stationary one would not have entered my mind until either a) a few seconds afterwards when someone else was on the verge of making a comment to that effect or b) if one of my siblings had made the original comment and I was being an annoying big brother. The "sun standing still" is the natural, intuitive observation, which is immediately understandable regardless of your cosmology.


----------



## MW

Zenas said:


> Geocentricity is untenable and is neither necessarily nor possibly deduced from Scripture. God's Word is not a science book. He wrote it to convey to us specific things, i.e. special revelation. Everything else is general revelation. Heliocentricity is deduced from general revelation.



This simply reduces the Bible to a set of propositions it may or may not declare. This would make reason the revealer rather than God.

More dogmatism!

Geocentricity is equally deduced from general revelation. Philosophers have clearly stated that the conclusion depends entirely on what is assumed when examining the data.


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> The "sun standing still" is the natural, intuitive observation, which is immediately understandable regardless of your cosmology.



Again, you leave out of view the fact that Joshua told the sun to stand still, which was part and parcel of the miracle. It is not a matter of mere observation; his command was instrumental to the miracle.


----------



## Skyler

Lynnie--I see where you're coming from, I think. But here's a graphical, interactive demonstration of the Michelson-Morley experiment that might help clarify it for you:

Michelson-Morley Experiment

Basically, they were testing to see if the Earth's velocity would make a difference in the speed of light--and it didn't, confirming Einstein's hypothesis.

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 06:20:47 EST-----



armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> The "sun standing still" is the natural, intuitive observation, which is immediately understandable regardless of your cosmology.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Again, you leave out of view the fact that Joshua told the sun to stand still, which was part and parcel of the miracle. It is not a matter of mere observation; his command was instrumental to the miracle.
Click to expand...


I don't think I am. Joshua told the sun to stand still, and it did. Where's the problem?


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> I don't think I am. Joshua told the sun to stand still, and it did. Where's the problem?



There isn't a problem *if* one accepts that the sun historically, in the time-space continuum, literally stood still.


----------



## Zenas

The Sun did stand still relative to the Earth, because the Sun appeared to be moving and then stopped. The Earth stopped rotating in order for that to happen, presumably. 

Also, reading this verse to convey that the Earth revolves around the Sun fails to consider the fact that God talks down to us. He speaks to us in ways that we understand. People, for thousands of years, would not have understood that the Sun appeared to move around the Earth because the Earth was rotating, and it, in fact, was revolving around the Sun. 

To quote my favorite line from the Mothman Prophecies, "Have you ever tried to explain yourself to a cockroach?".


----------



## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> I don't think I am. Joshua told the sun to stand still, and it did. Where's the problem?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> There isn't a problem *if* one accepts that the sun historically, in the time-space continuum, literally stood still.
Click to expand...


From a heliocentric perspective, I only use the technical wording in a qualified setting. 

Coupled with the fact that this section is rendered in the ESV and NASB as poetry, designated by being set apart from the rest of the passage, I don't see any reason why I can't accept this as an "everyday" use of the term rather than a technical use of the term. 

After all, Joshua didn't have to explain the mechanics of how to make the sun stand still to God.


----------



## MW

Zenas said:


> The Sun did stand still relative to the Earth, because the Sun appeared to be moving and then stopped. The Earth stopped rotating in order for that to happen, presumably.
> 
> Also, reading this verse to convey that the Earth revolves around the Sun fails to consider the fact that God talks down to us. He speaks to us in ways that we understand.



Again, Joshua told the sun to stand still. Part of the miracle is the fact that the sun obeyed his voice. Only liberals believe that God has accommodated the Scriptures to our misconceptions.


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> After all, Joshua didn't have to explain the mechanics of how to make the sun stand still to God.



This is poor exegesis. Typical of the allegorical method.


----------



## Peairtach

Comparing Scripture with Scripture, I'm willing to defend Six Day creation as biblical, but to put unecessary stumblingblocks in the way of unbelievers like geocentrism, when the language of the Bible on this is clearly accomodatory, seems perverse.


----------



## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> After all, Joshua didn't have to explain the mechanics of how to make the sun stand still to God.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This is poor exegesis. Typical of the allegorical method.
Click to expand...


I'm having difficulty believing that you are serious here. Why are you focusing on the light-hearted part of my post(indicated by a smiley: ) instead of the argument? Furthermore, are you rejecting the concept of language of appearance?


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> I'm having difficulty believing that you are serious here. Why are you focusing on the light-hearted part of my post(indicated by a smiley: ) instead of the argument? Furthermore, are you rejecting the concept of language of appearance?



I accept the Calvinian, not the Cartesian, teaching of accommodation. I suggest participants in this thread do some reading on this subject in order to discover the difference. Your advocacy of Cartesian accommodation equally justifies liberal explanations of Bible miracles.


----------



## Skyler

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> I'm having difficulty believing that you are serious here. Why are you focusing on the light-hearted part of my post(indicated by a smiley: ) instead of the argument? Furthermore, are you rejecting the concept of language of appearance?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I accept the Calvinian, not the Cartesian, teaching of accommodation. I suggest participants in this thread do some reading on this subject in order to discover the difference. Your advocacy of Cartesian accommodation equally justifies liberal explanations of Bible miracles.
Click to expand...


Perhaps you could recommend an article or two on the subject? I'm not sure how using everyday language instead of needlessly complicated technical explanations is "liberal".


----------



## Peairtach

I believe that God _really_ made the Earth stand still for Joshua. Truly amazing, when you think of all that involved.


----------



## MW

Richard Tallach said:


> I believe that God _really_ made the Earth stand still for Joshua.



Then you don't believe the Bible on this point.


----------



## Zenas

Bowing out. This is absolutely incredible. As bad as flat-Earth theory.


----------



## MW

Skyler said:


> Perhaps you could recommend an article or two on the subject? I'm not sure how using everyday language instead of needlessly complicated technical explanations is "liberal".



A good start would be Henry Krabbendam's "Warfield v Berkouwer on Scripture" in Inerrancy, edited by Norman L. Geisler, and especially the sections which compare the earlier and later views of Berkouwer. Berkouwer is a perfect example of changes in "reformed" thinking on the subject, in which Scripture ceases to be revelation _per se_ but becomes a witness to revelation.

Everyday phenomonological language is to be accepted in the Bible only where it can be proven by internal markers in the text, not from quasi-scientific considerations being imposed on the text.


----------



## MW

Zenas said:


> Bowing out. This is absolutely incredible. As bad as flat-Earth theory.



"Flat earth theory" was a post-Darwinian polemic to manipulate opponents.


----------



## py3ak

Mr. Winzer, if I understand the drift of your remarks correctly, the vital point is that Joshua commands the sun and moon to stand still, and they obeyed. It seems to me like that is the biggest difficulty for those who think that the language here is either accommodated to contemporary views, or that it is phenomenological; because Joshua commanded the sun, and the sun obeyed his voice. When the command is directed to the sun, saying that the earth obeyed doesn't really seem like interpreting the text in the most straightforward way.

In other words, if it didn't say that Joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still, but merely that they did so, would it be possible to understand it as described from the standpoint of the observer, without implying any comment on the functioning of the superlunary? 

Can you give an instance of a place where phenomenological language might be legitimately seen in Scripture?


----------



## MW

py3ak said:


> In other words, if it didn't say that Joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still, but merely that they did so, would it be possible to understand it as described from the standpoint of the observer, without implying any comment on the functioning of the superlunary?



Ruben, yes, it _could_ then be seen as phenomenological, but the weight of assumption would still rest with the historical, which requires it to be interpreted as a literal event. Some literary markers would be necessary to conclude that this was just how it appeared and not rather what actually happened. Even then, however, interpreting cosmological phenomena in Scripture requires an understanding of biblical cosmology. The fact is that the Bible everywhere presents the sun in motion relative to the earth. And it is also a fact that science truly so called allows various geocentric functions, e.g., navigation. Hence there is no reason for interpreting the biblical text in a figurative or less than literal manner. Special revelation requires us to understand that the sun literally stood still and general revelation really offers no voice of criticism to it.



py3ak said:


> Can you give an instance of a place where phenomenological language might be legitimately seen in Scripture?



I can think of numerous places where the Scriptures speak of things "as it were." E.g., Numb. 9:15, "And on the day that the tabernacle was reared up the cloud covered the tabernacle, namely, the tent of the testimony: and at even there was upon the tabernacle *as it were* the appearance of fire, until the morning."


----------



## Philip

I must say that unbelievers who read this thread are going to be laughing that we even debate this stuff.

Reverend Winzer, could you possibly name some major geocentric Reformed theologians post-Galileo so that we might be able to see where you're coming from. It seems to me that had heliocentrism been generally accepted before the Reformation, that the reformers would have accepted it.

I should also note that the sun does move relative to the earth.


----------



## py3ak

armourbearer said:


> py3ak said:
> 
> 
> 
> In other words, if it didn't say that Joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still, but merely that they did so, would it be possible to understand it as described from the standpoint of the observer, without implying any comment on the functioning of the superlunary?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Ruben, yes, it _could_ then be seen as phenomenological, but the weight of assumption would still rest with the historical, which requires it to be interpreted as a literal event. Some literary markers would be necessary to conclude that this was just how it appeared and not rather what actually happened. Even then, however, interpreting cosmological phenomena in Scripture requires an understanding of biblical cosmology. The fact is that the Bible everywhere presents the sun in motion relative to the earth. And it is also a fact that science truly so called allows various geocentric functions, e.g., navigation. Hence there is no reason for interpreting the biblical text in a figurative or less than literal manner. Special revelation requires us to understand that the sun literally stood still and general revelation really offers no voice of criticism to it.
> 
> 
> 
> py3ak said:
> 
> 
> 
> Can you give an instance of a place where phenomenological language might be legitimately seen in Scripture?
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> I can think of numerous places where the Scriptures speak of things "as it were." E.g., Numb. 9:15, "And on the day that the tabernacle was reared up the cloud covered the tabernacle, namely, the tent of the testimony: and at even there was upon the tabernacle *as it were* the appearance of fire, until the morning."
Click to expand...


Thanks, Mr. Winzer. I just wanted to be sure I was understanding if the _command_ was the real sticking point in the narrative, and that phenomenological language is (in other texts) a legitimate category to use in interpretation.


----------



## MW

P. F. Pugh said:


> Reverend Winzer, could you possibly name some major geocentric Reformed theologians post-Galileo so that we might be able to see where you're coming from.



Wilhelmus a Brakel (The Christian's Reasonable Service) represents the Dutch conservative school which adamantly opposed the Cartesian accommodation of secular science:



> "The truth is that God states in many places in His Word that the sun is in motion, her circuit resulting in both day and night, and that the world remains both motionless and stationary. Nowhere does God speak to the contrary, as we will demonstrate in chapter 8. Since God states it to be so, it is truth and we are to embrace it as truth. Is not God the Creator, maintainer, and governor of all things, who is much better acquainted with His own work than is man with his limited and darkened understanding? Should men not subject their judgment to the very sayings of God? Or should one attempt to bend and twist the clear declarations of God in such a way that they agree with our erroneous thinking? Whatever God declares, also concerning things in the realm of nature, is true. God says that the world is motionless and stationary, being circled by the sun, and thus it is a certain and incontrovertible truth."


----------



## VaughanRSmith

Matthew, could you please demonstrate exegetically how this verse is incompatible with a heliocentric view of the galaxy?



> And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
> (Jos 10:13)


----------



## lynnie

skyler....I really mean it when I say that I appreciate you trying to understand where I am coming from. Its like a credo-paedo debate where somebody actually tries to understand the other side. I mean, my poor PCA pastor has had people in his life tell him he must not have ever read the bible if he believes in infant baptism. God will use you greatly in ministry if you try and be the kind of person who attempts to understand the other side. I've gotten tired of the " flat earth" cracks over the years. So thank you.

you said: _Basically, they were testing to see if the Earth's velocity would make a difference in the speed of light--and it didn't, confirming Einstein's hypothesis._

Actually, chronologically it is the other way around. In 1887 M/M showed that there was no velocity of the earth. In 1905 Einstein published his theory. So yes indeed, the MM experiment confirms Einsteins hypothesis IF and only if you are heliocentric and need a way to explain why the earth appears to not have a velocity. If you are geo, you don't need the theory of relativity.

Like I said, both models work. The real scientific ( not scripture) debate in my opinion must come down to relativity- proven or debunked. You must accept that visible light behaves differently than any other measured wave velocity of the electromagnetic spectrum. 

You have to accept that as the earth revolves around the Sun at a speed of about thirty kilometers per second, if we repeat the experiment six months later, we should expect to find a difference of sixty kilometers per second, as the Earth moves away from the particular star's light. And it does not. So either Einsten is right and visible light behaves differently than radar, x-rays, radio waves, microwaves, etc, or, the earth stands still.

By the way geocentrists do believe in the ether. They call it the firmament. All the heavenly bodies exist in something invisible but "firm." I am not sure if the dark matter theories are the same thing. Guess I need to go read up the geocentric sites one of these days. Been a while.


----------



## Archlute

P. F. Pugh said:


> I must say that unbelievers who read this thread are going to be laughing that we even debate this stuff.



Without weighing in either way on this discussion, I would like to say that unbelievers would laugh about a lot of things here if they were to read them. 

Which unbeliever do you know who would accept that he has been blinded, bound, and is part of the kingdom of darkness? A domain whose head is known as the Prince of the Power of the Air (Col. 1:13; Eph. 2:2)? Or that we believe in the Holy Spirit, or even in angels and demons (which is sooooooo, pre-enlightenment!)? 

If it is a biblically oriented discussion, regardless of the interpretive differences shown, we should not be too embarrassed or intimidated to discuss it. This is also why passages such as 1 Tim. 2:12, Titus 2:3-5, and 1 Pet. 3:7 get so little air time from either pulpit or lectern in our churches.


----------



## Grillsy

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> The "sun standing still" is the natural, intuitive observation, which is immediately understandable regardless of your cosmology.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Again, you leave out of view the fact that Joshua told the sun to stand still, which was part and parcel of the miracle. It is not a matter of mere observation; his command was instrumental to the miracle.
Click to expand...


Jesus said the mustard seed was the smallest of seeds which it is not. Are you now going to argue that it is the smallest seed? Surely there is another way to understand this, just as there could be another to understand the sun standing still.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> Matthew, could you please demonstrate exegetically how this verse is incompatible with a heliocentric view of the galaxy?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
> (Jos 10:13)
Click to expand...


Hello Vaughan, nice to see you again.

I am averse to making heliocentric and geocentric views exclusive of one another. As noted, scientists use both views for different purposes. My only concern is to see the Bible interpreted in its own right, and not have spurious astronomical theories thrust upon it.

I think I have already expressed my exegetical concerns by noting the miracle in the context of verse 12, where Joshua's command is instrumental to the event. While it is conceivable that the Bible might use phenomenological language to refer to a miracle, the fact is that in this case it is impossible to construe Joshua's command in a figurative manner. On that basis I conclude that the narrative intends to teach the standing still as an an historical event and that the sun was the literal body which stood still.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> Matthew, could you please demonstrate exegetically how this verse is incompatible with a heliocentric view of the galaxy?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
> (Jos 10:13)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> Hello Vaughan, nice to see you again.
> 
> I am averse to making heliocentric and geocentric views exclusive of one another. As noted, scientists use both views for different purposes. My only concern is to see the Bible interpreted in its own right, and not have spurious astronomical theories thrust upon it.
> 
> I think I have already expressed my exegetical concerns by noting the miracle in the context of verse 12, where Joshua's command is instrumental to the event. While it is conceivable that the Bible might use phenomenological language to refer to a miracle, the fact is that in this case it is impossible to construe Joshua's command in a figurative manner. On that basis I conclude that the narrative intends to teach the standing still as an an historical event and that the sun was the literal body which stood still.
Click to expand...

Good to be back. Things have been a little hectic down here in Sydney-land.

You say that it is impossible to interpret Joshua's command in a figurative manner, but isn't the command itself construed in a figurative way?



> Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.
> (Jos 10:12)


We can't force the text to say anything that it doesn't, but wouldn't your understanding of the command mean that the sun, technically, should have stood still _upon_ Gibeon, and the moon have stood still _in_ the Valley of Ajalon?


----------



## MW

Grillsy said:


> Jesus said the mustard seed was the smallest of seeds which it is not. Are you now going to argue that it is the smallest seed? Surely there is another way to understand this, just as there could be another to understand the sun standing still.



Parabolic teaching utilises popular and proverbial figures of speech which do not require empirical accuracy. This is altogether different from an historical narrative which purports to be relating an event and particularly a miraculous event.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> We can't force the text to say anything that it doesn't, but wouldn't your understanding of the command mean that the sun, technically, should have stood still _upon_ Gibeon, and the moon have stood still _in_ the Valley of Ajalon?



Good observation! Prepositions are quite expandable, especially in concrete Hebrew language, and so must be understood according to their context. The event itself, however, still requires a literal understanding regardless of the exact location where Joshua was situated.


----------



## Grillsy

armourbearer said:


> Grillsy said:
> 
> 
> 
> Jesus said the mustard seed was the smallest of seeds which it is not. Are you now going to argue that it is the smallest seed? Surely there is another way to understand this, just as there could be another to understand the sun standing still.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Parabolic teaching utilises popular and proverbial figures of speech which do not require empirical accuracy. This is altogether different from an historical narrative which purports to be relating an event and particularly a miraculous event.
Click to expand...


Indeed. But doesn't historical writing have to make sense to the original audience as well? Could this not have been an instance of what appeared to have happened as would have been understood by those at the time.


----------



## MW

Grillsy said:


> Indeed. But doesn't historical writing have to make sense to the original audience as well? Could this not have been an instance of what appeared to have happened as would have been understood by those at the time.



As explained earlier, this requires accommodation to mistaken conceptions, which is liberal accommodation. Think of the consequences if this possibility was actually entertained. The liberals would have all the justification they need for explaining away the miraculous in the Bible since everyone to whom the Bible was written thought in terms of the miraculous.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> We can't force the text to say anything that it doesn't, but wouldn't your understanding of the command mean that the sun, technically, should have stood still _upon_ Gibeon, and the moon have stood still _in_ the Valley of Ajalon?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Good observation! Prepositions are quite expandable, especially in concrete Hebrew language, and so must be understood according to their context. The event itself, however, still requires a literal understanding regardless of the exact location where Joshua was situated.
Click to expand...

Ugh... don't remind me of Hebrew. I've got an exam coming up, and never want to read backwards again. Can't we just stick with the LXX? 

I think this is where I don't understand where you're coming from. I'm happy to accept the event as literal - the sun stood still in the heavens. This is what is written, and I believe it literally. However, the statement says nothing about the means. Could one believe that God listened to Joshua and caused the entire galaxy to stand still in the heavens? I certainly believe that.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> Ugh... don't remind me of Hebrew. I've got an exam coming up, and never want to read backwards again. Can't we just stick with the LXX?



They have to be cruel to be kind. You will thank them later. Maybe. 



Exagorazo said:


> Could one believe that God listened to Joshua and caused the entire galaxy to stand still in the heavens? I certainly believe that.



This is where I must voice my concern that the Bible be interpreted in its own right. Where are the other "possibilities" coming from? Not from the text. Then they should have no bearing on the interpretation of the text.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Grillsy said:
> 
> 
> 
> Indeed. But doesn't historical writing have to make sense to the original audience as well? Could this not have been an instance of what appeared to have happened as would have been understood by those at the time.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> As explained earlier, this requires accommodation to mistaken conceptions, which is liberal accommodation. Think of the consequences if this possibility was actually entertained. The liberals would have all the justification they need for explaining away the miraculous in the Bible since everyone to whom the Bible was written thought in terms of the miraculous.
Click to expand...

This is an interesting argument, and maybe it fits in another thread?

I've never studied this in detail, but would there be a problem with assuming a difference between conceptions - take the wedding at Cana for instance. There is a difference between the Cosmological conceptions of the people of the Old Testament and the conceptions which would lead one to believe that "wine is wine and will always be wine", isn't there?


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer said:


> As explained earlier, this requires accommodation to mistaken conceptions, which is liberal accommodation. Think of the consequences if this possibility was actually entertained. The liberals would have all the justification they need for explaining away the miraculous in the Bible since everyone to whom the Bible was written thought in terms of the miraculous.


 
A mistaken conception as accommodation would be Jesus walking on the water when in reality he was just walking on the rocks just below the water. But given that the sun and moon stood still in relation to the people that saw it, either model can accept that, since staying and going are relative to a vantage point and the thing moving. You seem to be saying that the sun stood still in relation to absolute space, rather than the people that saw the event.


----------



## Grillsy

Vytautas said:


> armourbearer said:
> 
> 
> 
> As explained earlier, this requires accommodation to mistaken conceptions, which is liberal accommodation. Think of the consequences if this possibility was actually entertained. The liberals would have all the justification they need for explaining away the miraculous in the Bible since everyone to whom the Bible was written thought in terms of the miraculous.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A mistaken conception as accommodation would be Jesus walking on the water when in reality he was just walking on the rocks just below the water. But given that the sun and moon stood still in relation to the people that saw it, either model can accept that, since staying and going are relative to a vantage point and the thing moving. You seem to be saying that the sun stood still in relation to absolute space, rather than the people that saw the event.
Click to expand...


That is what I was trying to say. That is what he was responding to in your quoted passage. You said it much better than myself, I salute you.


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> You seem to be saying that the sun stood still in relation to absolute space, rather than the people that saw the event.



Yes, I am saying the miracle was an actual event rather than something the people "apparently" witnessed.


----------



## lynnie

If both models work perfectly fine, why do some people have such a problem with believing the biblical one?

The answer is that Einstein has become canon, sorry to say.


----------



## OPC'n

armourbearer said:


> Skyler said:
> 
> 
> 
> But the Bible doesn't explicitly provide a geocentric model; it's implicitly derived from linguistic expressions. Like I've said before, the Bible isn't a science textbook, intended to provide us with a model of the universe. We shouldn't treat it as such.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Fascinating how quickly scientific questions can turn people into Bible experts. The miracle in Joshua is not a linguistic expression. The sun stood still. It is history!
Click to expand...


The sun stood still bc the earth stood still simple as that. The sun doesn't revolve around the earth.


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> You seem to be saying that the sun stood still in relation to absolute space, rather than the people that saw the event.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes, I am saying the miracle was an actual event rather than something the people "apparently" witnessed.
Click to expand...

 
When I say that the people that saw the event, I mean that their seeing is the vantage point while the sun is the thing standing still, but you are saying that the vantage point is space itself. It seems that the text uses the people on the earth as the vantage point of the event, rather than absolute space. I am disagreeing over the vantage point and not over the fact that the event happened.


----------



## MW

OPC'n said:


> The sun stood still bc the earth stood still simple as that. The sun doesn't revolve around the earth.



And whence in the Bible have you derived this belief?


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> I am disagreeing over the vantage point and not over the fact that the event happened.



No, you are disagreeing with *what* stood still. The Bible says *what* stood still, and you do not accept it.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> I've never studied this in detail, but would there be a problem with assuming a difference between conceptions - take the wedding at Cana for instance. There is a difference between the Cosmological conceptions of the people of the Old Testament and the conceptions which would lead one to believe that "wine is wine and will always be wine", isn't there?



Sorry, Vaughan, I'm struggling to understand the question. Are you asking if the conceptions of the people are more instrumental in the OT than in Cana, or something else?


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> I am disagreeing over the vantage point and not over the fact that the event happened.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> No, you are disagreeing with *what* stood still. The Bible says *what* stood still, and you do not accept it.
Click to expand...

 
Staying still is a relation. If a man is driving with me in my car, and I look at him, to me that man is staying still. He is not moving 45 mph when I look at him, but from the vantage point of a man outside of the car he is. I accept that the sun and moon stood still in realation to the people on earth.


----------



## au5t1n

Geocentrists,

I am an engineering student and a burgeoning physicist, and I have a few questions for clarification, if you please:

1. Am I correct in understanding that in the geocentric model, the sun revolves around the earth, while the other planets and such revolve around the sun? Please correct this impression if it is wrong.

2. What is the physical explanation, in the geocentric model, for a body of greater mass (the sun) revolving around a body of lesser mass (the earth), when no other bodies I am aware of behave like this, including the other heavenly bodies besides the earth in the geocentric model?


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> I accept that the sun and moon stood still in realation to the people on earth.



Just as the liberal accepts that Jesus walked on water in relation to the people. There is no actual miracle here.


----------



## toddpedlar

armourbearer said:


> I can allow that science might work with a variety of models and it would be unscientific to be dogmatic on a point for which there can only be limited evidence and experimentation. OTOH, the Bible provides one, and only one model, and that is the geocentric model, and the Bible is true in all it says. "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God."



With all due respect, Matthew (and we disagree on so little) this is a problematic assumption. The Bible also presents a flat Earth with four corners, but I imagine that you do not believe that the world is that way.


----------



## OPC'n

armourbearer said:


> OPC'n said:
> 
> 
> 
> The sun stood still bc the earth stood still simple as that. The sun doesn't revolve around the earth.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And whence in the Bible have you derived this belief?
Click to expand...


Did God command the sun and moon to stand still or did Joshua? *Joshua said to the LORD *in the presence of Israel: "O sun, stand still over Gibeon, O moon, over the Valley of Aijalon." This is a prayer from Joshua to God. Joshua wanted time to stand still. Joshua is just a man and didn't know how the earth rotated around the earth. As far as he could tell it was the sun and moon moving not the earth. So when he prayed to God for "time to stand still" he asked according to his limited knowledge. God wasn't going to say, "Ok, Joshua, here's a science lesson for you....." God just answered his prayer by stopping the earth from rotating for awhile. If God had commanded the sun and moon to stand still, you *might* have a leg on which to stand. Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> I accept that the sun and moon stood still in realation to the people on earth.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Just as the liberal accepts that Jesus walked on water in relation to the people. There is no actual miracle here.
Click to expand...

 
Yes, but they would say that walking on water is a misconception, since he walked on ice or rocks. The moon and sun staying still in relation to the the people on earth would be true for both positions. I do not see the parallel, since walking on ice or rocks is a natural explaination of events, while the sun staying still is a miracle no mater how it happened.


----------



## toddpedlar

austinww said:


> Geocentrists,
> 
> I am an engineering student and a burgeoning physicist, and I have a few questions for clarification, if you please:
> 
> 1. Am I correct in understanding that in the geocentric model, the sun revolves around the earth, while the other planets and such revolve around the sun? Please correct this impression if it is wrong.



Yes, that is the modern geocentric view. All the stars are also said to be embedded in a 'plenum' or crystal-like sphere that rotates around the Earth also with a 24 hour period.



> 2. What is the physical explanation, in the geocentric model, for a body of greater mass (the sun) revolving around a body of lesser mass (the earth), when no other bodies I am aware of behave like this, including the other heavenly bodies besides the earth in the geocentric model?



I'd like to see someone actually attempt a "physical" model that tries to explain this, and not one that ultimately rests on the assertion that the Sun (and everything else) revolves around the Earth.


----------



## MW

toddpedlar said:


> With all due respect, Matthew (and we disagree on so little) this is a problematic assumption. The Bible also presents a flat Earth with four corners, but I imagine that you do not believe that the world is that way.



No, it doesn't. As noted, this is a post-Darwinan polemic aimed at manipulating its opponents into accepting "scientific" advance.


----------



## Philip

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> I accept that the sun and moon stood still in realation to the people on earth.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Just as the liberal accepts that Jesus walked on water in relation to the people. There is no actual miracle here.
Click to expand...


The earth and moon standing still is just as much of a miracle as the sun and moon standing still.


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> Yes, but they would say that walking on water is a misconception, since he walked on ice or rocks.



Everything advanced to date indicates the "misconception" that the people thought in terms of the sun moving. But they can hardly be called as reliable witnesses to the occurrence of a work which transcends nature when they can't be trusted to know the way nature ordinarily works.


----------



## MW

OPC'n said:


> Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.



If you don't believe in the plenary inspiration of Scripture I don't think this is the forum for you.


----------



## MW

P. F. Pugh said:


> The earth and moon standing still is just as much of a miracle as the sun and moon standing still.



It would be, and we could believe it happened if the Scriptures actually recorded it. But the Scriptures don't; therefore we have no basis for believing it happened.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> OPC'n said:
> 
> 
> 
> Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If you don't believe in the plenary inspiration of Scripture I don't think this is the forum for you.
Click to expand...

She is referring to a quote of Joshua. Other examples of men who are quoted speaking error in the Bible include Satan, Job's friends, Sadducees, etc. However, since the Bible is inerrant, everything it says they said, they did indeed say. It does not make their quoted statements _themselves accurate_. Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.


----------



## OPC'n

armourbearer said:


> OPC'n said:
> 
> 
> 
> Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If you don't believe in the plenary inspiration of Scripture I don't think this is the forum for you.
Click to expand...


Jacob told Isaac that he was Esau. Now, do you believe that Jacob got a word from God to believe that he was Esau and to tell his father that he was? This is just one example of what I said.

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 09:51:41 EST-----



austinww said:


> armourbearer said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> OPC'n said:
> 
> 
> 
> Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If you don't believe in the plenary inspiration of Scripture I don't think this is the forum for you.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> She is referring to a quote of Joshua. Other examples of men who are quoted speaking error in the Bible include Satan, Job's friends, Sadducees, etc. However, since the Bible is inerrant, everything it says they said, they did indeed say. It does not make their quoted statements _themselves accurate_. Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.
Click to expand...


Thank you! I didn't think what I said was too astounding that it needed clarification.


----------



## Montanablue

armourbearer said:


> OPC'n said:
> 
> 
> 
> Remember not everything men say in the Bible is a direct word from God. They spoke according to their own knowledge many times.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If you don't believe in the plenary inspiration of Scripture I don't think this is the forum for you.
Click to expand...


I think that you are grossly misunderstanding Sarah.( And I'm not sure how, because her statement seemed quite clear). She is not saying that the Bible is uninspired or that it is not God's Word. She is pointing out that in narrative sections, individuals are quoted. And those quotations do not necessarily reflect God's word or truth. There are many many examples of this - surely we would not maintain that every person that speaks in the Bible is the voice of God.


----------



## toddpedlar

lynnie said:


> skyler....I really mean it when I say that I appreciate you trying to understand where I am coming from. Its like a credo-paedo debate where somebody actually tries to understand the other side. I mean, my poor PCA pastor has had people in his life tell him he must not have ever read the bible if he believes in infant baptism. God will use you greatly in ministry if you try and be the kind of person who attempts to understand the other side. I've gotten tired of the " flat earth" cracks over the years. So thank you.
> 
> you said: _Basically, they were testing to see if the Earth's velocity would make a difference in the speed of light--and it didn't, confirming Einstein's hypothesis._
> 
> Actually, chronologically it is the other way around. In 1887 M/M showed that there was no velocity of the earth. In 1905 Einstein published his theory. So yes indeed, the MM experiment confirms Einsteins hypothesis IF and only if you are heliocentric and need a way to explain why the earth appears to not have a velocity. If you are geo, you don't need the theory of relativity.



Huh? With all due respect, Lynnie, you have misunderstood the result of the MM experiment and its conclusion. Geocentrists need relativity just like everyone else. It is an experimental fact, borne out in a multitude of different experiments that have nothing whatsoever to do with the MM experiment. 



> Like I said, both models work.



This is also a misrepresentation. A model works insofar as it can explain observations. The geocentric model cannot explain why the whole universe revolves around the Earth (while the planets do not revolve around the Earth, but instead revolve around the Sun). 



> The real scientific ( not scripture) debate in my opinion must come down to relativity- proven or debunked. You must accept that visible light behaves differently than any other measured wave velocity of the electromagnetic spectrum.



Would you like to explain yourself here? Where is there any postulated difference required for visible light vs. other forms of electromagnetic radiation? TO what experiment are you referring when you say this?



> You have to accept that as the earth revolves around the Sun at a speed of about thirty kilometers per second, if we repeat the experiment six months later, we should expect to find a difference of sixty kilometers per second, as the Earth moves away from the particular star's light. And it does not. So either Einsten is right and visible light behaves differently than radar, x-rays, radio waves, microwaves, etc, or, the earth stands still.



You probably need to look again at the MM experiment, because your answer here indicates that you seem to have misunderstood what was measured and how. 



> By the way geocentrists do believe in the ether. They call it the firmament. All the heavenly bodies exist in something invisible but "firm." I am not sure if the dark matter theories are the same thing. Guess I need to go read up the geocentric sites one of these days. Been a while.



They may believe in the ether, and it's certainly convenient for them to do so since in their model its being disproven is an impossibility. 

However, the existence or non-existence of the ether is irrelevant when it comes to proving that the Earth moves relative to the stars and not they relative to the Earth. Stellar parallax is a perfect example (the annual shift of nearer stars' apparent positions relative to stars that are farther away). This is a difficult measurement to make, but has been seen in many, many cases. Just as the apparent position of your finger changes relative to the background behind it as you hold your arm outstretched and look first with one eye and then the other, nearer stars shift position relative to those farther away on a six-month time frame that corresponds to the extremes of the Earth's annual motion around the sun.

The Earth also spins on its axis. This is easily proven through the Coriolis effect, which is a long-standing, well-known problem from very long ago. It is impossible to explain adequately if the Earth is not in fact spinning on its axis.


----------



## Montanablue

Oops - cross-posted. Sorry. Austin said it better anyway.


----------



## MW

austinww said:


> Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.



God didn't reprimand the penman of Job for errant statements. The text in question does not pertain to different perspectives in a narrative, but to narration. To claim there is inspired and uninspired speech in the narration is to claim that the penmen were not fully inspired.


----------



## MW

Montanablue said:


> She is pointing out that in narrative sections, individuals are quoted.



If that had have been pointed out, it would have been fair enough, but it would have been irrelevant to this discussion as this discussion pertains to the narration of the inspired penman not to recorded speeches by uninspired men.


----------



## Philip

armourbearer said:


> P. F. Pugh said:
> 
> 
> 
> The earth and moon standing still is just as much of a miracle as the sun and moon standing still.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It would be, and we could believe it happened if the Scriptures actually recorded it. But the Scriptures don't; therefore we have no basis for believing it happened.
Click to expand...


But they do. Unlike you, I don't think that this passage demands a geocentric interpretation. You also still have not answered my question regarding space expeditions that have collected evidence of the heliocentric view. Is this just propaganda?


----------



## Montanablue

armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> God didn't reprimand the penman of Job for errant statements. The text in question does not pertain to different perspectives in a narrative, but to narration. To claim there is inspired and uninspired speech in the narration is to claim that the penmen were not fully inspired.
Click to expand...


This doesn't pertain to Sarah's comment. Neither she nor Austin claimed that the penman was uninspired - in fact they said the opposite. Their argument (and mine as well) is that the statements of Job's friends, while reported accurately by the inspired writer, _do not reflect the voice of God_. The same pertains to any comments made by Joshua. The inspired writer is reporting Joshua's prayer. Joshua's prayer itself is not necessarily inspired.

Edit: I cross-posted and didn't see your earlier comment, which is why the above doesn't address it. Anyway, I'm going to bow out of this and let others do the talking. This has simply become far too obtuse.


----------



## Spinningplates2

toddpedlar said:


> armourbearer said:
> 
> 
> 
> I can allow that science might work with a variety of models and it would be unscientific to be dogmatic on a point for which there can only be limited evidence and experimentation. OTOH, the Bible provides one, and only one model, and that is the geocentric model, and the Bible is true in all it says. "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> With all due respect, Matthew (and we disagree on so little) this is a problematic assumption. The Bible also presents a flat Earth with four corners, but I imagine that you do not believe that the world is that way.
Click to expand...


The whole flat earth thing is/was a tool to make Christians and the people of the past seem stupid. The biggest lie being that Christopher Colombus was afraid he might sail off the edge of the world.


----------



## MW

P. F. Pugh said:


> But they do. Unlike you, I don't think that this passage demands a geocentric interpretation.



And I reject your allegorical interpretation. We will have to leave it there.



P. F. Pugh said:


> You also still have not answered my question regarding space expeditions that have collected evidence of the heliocentric view. Is this just propaganda?



I am not a scientist; I am addressing the issue from the perspective of exegesis.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> God didn't reprimand the penman of Job for errant statements. The text in question does not pertain to different perspectives in a narrative, but to narration. To claim there is inspired and uninspired speech in the narration is to claim that the penmen were not fully inspired.
Click to expand...

If Joshua had said, "2+2=5" (for whatever reason), and an inspired author had written, "And then Joshua said, '2+2=5,'" the author would still have written inerrantly, but Joshua would have spoken errantly.


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> Yes, but they would say that walking on water is a misconception, since he walked on ice or rocks.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Everything advanced to date indicates the "misconception" that the people thought in terms of the sun moving. But they can hardly be called as reliable witnesses to the occurrence of a work which transcends nature when they can't be trusted to know the way nature ordinarily works.
Click to expand...

 
You say this as an example of misconception as accommodation. But what is the misconception in saying that the sun stood still in relation to the earth?


----------



## Philip

armourbearer said:


> P. F. Pugh said:
> 
> 
> 
> But they do. Unlike you, I don't think that this passage demands a geocentric interpretation.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And I reject your allegorical interpretation. We will have to leave it there.
Click to expand...


Allegorical? I'm done here. _Pilgrim's Progress_ is allegory. Apocalyptic literature is allegory. I am not calling this passage allegory, just suggesting that maybe it doesn't demand a geocentric interpretation.


----------



## OPC'n

armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> Indeed, God reprimanded Job's friends for their errant statements.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> God didn't reprimand the penman of Job for errant statements. The text in question does not pertain to different perspectives in a narrative, but to narration. To claim there is inspired and uninspired speech in the narration is to claim that the penmen were not fully inspired.
Click to expand...


*Nobody* is claiming that parts of the Bible is uninspired and you know that. Arguing in this fashion doesn't get you any points bc we all know it's a strawman's argument. But I will this time play your game. All that's in the Bible is inspired. Everything that everyone said in the Bible (including Satan) was allowed by God to be said. HOWEVER! There were false prophets who stated things in the Bible which were directly contrary to what God was saying through His prophets. Now that we've gone down this bunny trail, I will bow out of the conversation.


----------



## toddpedlar

armourbearer said:


> toddpedlar said:
> 
> 
> 
> With all due respect, Matthew (and we disagree on so little) this is a problematic assumption. The Bible also presents a flat Earth with four corners, but I imagine that you do not believe that the world is that way.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> No, it doesn't. As noted, this is a post-Darwinan polemic aimed at manipulating its opponents into accepting "scientific" advance.
Click to expand...


I simply do not see how the Bible requires geocentrism, when there are statements that are equally problematic (the four corners of the earth in Isa 11:12) if read with wooden literalism as those that on the face of it require the Sun to be moving and the Earth standing still. If I say "the sun stood still in the sky" while the Earth stopped rotating for a time, I would not be chargably speaking a falsehood. If I say "the sun rose today at 5:32am" I would equally well be held to speak truth, though the reason I could see the sun first at 5:32am is that the Earth had turned such that the sun was visible over the horizon at that time. If my words are not held to be false in these circumstances, then neither could the Holy Spirit be charged with an innaccuracy if He were to inspire words to similar effect under such circumstances. It is not appropriate to charge me (or others) with "allegorizing" Joshua's words in chapter 10 when we say the Earth spins, and was stopped from spinning for that time - it isn't allegorizing that's going on, but a recognition that the Bible does speak from the point of view of men even as it is inspired by the Spirit of God.


----------



## MW

Montanablue said:


> The inspired writer is reporting Joshua's prayer. Joshua's prayer itself is not necessarily inspired.



And I have repeatedly made the point that Joshua's prayer is instrumental in the miracle. "And there was no day like that before it or after it, that *the LORD hearkened unto the voice of a man*: for the LORD fought for Israel." To cast doubt on the factuality of the prayer or the event is to cast doubt on the miracle. To cast doubt on the narration of these is to cast doubt on the plenary inspiration of the Bible.


----------



## au5t1n

This time I was the one cross-posting. I think montanablue said it well.


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> You say this as an example of misconception as accommodation. But what is the misconception in saying that the sun stood still in relation to the earth?



There is no misconception as long as you accept it as fact and not merely the way it was perceived by people.


----------



## Brian Withnell

JennyG said:


> I'm interested to know what everyone thinks, because besides being a fascinating subject in itself, this seems to me to be of serious cultural and spiritual importance. The universal mental picture of Earth as peripheral and insignificant, one of the obscurest among a myriad inhabited planets, must have done more to undermine the Biblical world-view than almost anything else except biological evolution (to which it's closely related).
> 
> This isn't intended as a question for scientists, and I don't mean to start a technical discussion of the scientific evidence for or against. As a non-scientist, I have to approach it differently.
> 
> My starting point is just the fact that there IS scientific evidence for geocentricity. Who even knew that?? It seems to be a remarkably well-kept secret as far as the average layman is concerned.
> I have only now discovered (for eg) that for the purpose of predicting eclipses and so on, the geocentric model and the heliocentric fit equally well with observational evidence. It's just that this fact gets no publicity: not surprisingly when for any serious astronomer to suggest that the evidence points to geocentricity would mean the instant loss of all academic credibility (it's exactly the same with Young Earth Creationism). There are many who do think so, but their views are not going to make headlines any time soon.
> 
> However (this is the crux) if there is "good enough" scientific support for both positions without demonstrable consensus, - shouldn't Christians be looking to the Bible to tell us which is the true model?
> - and surely Scripture on balance asserts geocentricity much more unambiguously than it could possibly be said to assert the contrary.
> Besides, Earth is undeniably the spiritual centre of all things, so failing extraordinarily conclusive counter-evidence, one would naturally expect it also to be physically central (as is in fact powerfully implied in the account of Creation week).
> Finally, as soon as I question how come in that case heliocentricity could have gained universal credence - I know the answer.



Jenny,

The "evidence" that some so called scientists use to support a geocentric model falls flat as soon as you ask them what the path of a rocket fired into space would follow and they cannot easily predict it without first finding the path with a heliocentric model. The same hermeneutic for saying the geocentric model is true would be the same hermeneutic for a flat earth. We have orbited the earth, seen that it is not flat, measured the curvature, and know that the language was figurative when it speaks of "corners of the earth" in scripture.

The idea of a heliocentric solar system is what enabled the sending of a probe to intercept a comet (you can find stories on the mission called "Deep Impact" in many places). The idea of having a geocentric model of the solar system actually connect with a comet is about the same as what you might expect of hitting a bullet fired from a gun with another bullet fired from a gun a mile away.

The same is true of prediction of things like the comet that struck Jupiter. Saying what the model had to have been after the fact is child's play compared to predicting the path and getting it right before it strikes. Sending a satellite into space to pass by Saturn (Cassini space probe) and having it work would be impossible without a correct model. For that matter, sending a Mars lander would be impossible with anything but the most accurate model (and proved the undoing of one probe when one of the engineers used English units instead of metric on one attempt).

So what do I make of these things and the scripture? The scripture speaks truth in all that it says. It is inerrant and infallible in what God said in it ... but that does not mean that I (or any church) is infallible in interpretation of what it says. When even the reformers such as Calvin stated that they believed a geocentric view of the solar system, they did damage to what God had said by going beyond what God had revealed. Why do I think that? For the same reason that I think those that had forcefully stated the Earth was flat were wrong in their interpretation. God gives us the truth He desires to reveal in his word, not what we might want to know.

That said, there is a very close question that follows: How can I be sure (100% sure, without a doubt) that I am correct in anything that I read in scripture? In one sense, I cannot. It is not my positiveness that saves me ... it is the finished work of Christ, applied by the Holy Spirit, through faith that saves me. Faith is not sight, but our faith is not a "I hope it is" like we have no assurance at all. Even so, it is not tied to salvation either. We have assurance, but that is not salvation. We accept what God says ... and yet we hear what he says imperfectly (we are sinners, and even when we read the word of God, our understanding of it is tainted by our sin in this world ... we see as in a glass darkly). The real issue is that I know I, in myself, cannot possibly hope to interpret any of scripture purely (even with the Spirit's help). What I can know is that I can trust that Christ will deliver me from my sin (even in my misunderstanding of the scripture).

Is the Bible correct? Yes. Are we correct in interpretation? No. While we work diligently to know what it says, even those that are great men of faith that have gone before are wrong, be they never so diligent in studying what the Bible says, and in some way or other off. Just because we study the scriptures, does not mean that we study them aright. We bring to them our own sin and misconceptions, even as we do every other area of life. Our confidence is not in our interpretation of scripture, but in Christ. Is there a paradox in there? Perhaps. What we know of Christ, we know from scripture ... so we have to walk by faith that God in Christ has removed our heart of stone and given us a heart of flesh so we are not among the reprobate on the last day.

Those that study both the book of God's word and the book of God's work have an advantage over those that only look to one ... while priority is given to his word, when there is uncertainty in the word, and there is certainty in his work, we can trust that God does not lie to us in either.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> Montanablue said:
> 
> 
> 
> The inspired writer is reporting Joshua's prayer. Joshua's prayer itself is not necessarily inspired.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And I have repeatedly made the point that Joshua's prayer is instrumental in the miracle. "And there was no day like that before it or after it, that *the LORD hearkened unto the voice of a man*: for the LORD fought for Israel." To cast doubt on the factuality of the prayer or the event is to cast doubt on the miracle. To cast doubt on the narration of these is to cast doubt on the plenary inspiration of the Bible.
Click to expand...

All right, fair enough. Our point was simply that you too quickly accused Sarah of denying the plenary inspiration of Scripture when she was referring only to a quote within Scripture. Your point may be valid, but it does not cast doubt on her belief that Scripture is inspired. I think you misrepresented her intentions.


----------



## MW

austinww said:


> If Joshua had said, "2+2=5" (for whatever reason), and an inspired author had written, "And then Joshua said, '2+2=5,'" the author would still have written inerrantly, but Joshua would have spoken errantly.



But, to follow through on your analogy, the inspired writer effectively says, "God made 2+2=5, in answer to His servant," and that is what the allegorists refuse to accept.


----------



## MW

OPC'n said:


> *Nobody* is claiming that parts of the Bible is uninspired and you know that.



No, I don't know that. All I know is that you claimed the narration may be the word of God or the word of man. If you repudiate that, very good. But then you have no reason for not accepting the words of the text as the word of God.


----------



## toddpedlar

Another miraculous occurrence that is connected to Joshua's long day is the moving backward of the shadow moving backward on the steps in Hezekiah's day in 2 Kings 20. The clear indication there is that Hezekiah knows why a shadow advances in a forward direction, and thought it easy for the shadow to do this (as its cause, the Sun, would be moving forward during the course of the day, and its shadow would naturally advance). 

Did the normal course of things change in this event? The text says nothing about the Sun, yet because of 'scientific advance' we know what produces shadows. Hence we'd infer here that something happened even more unusual than in Joshua's day - the Sun actually moved in the sky backward according to its normal course. Scripture tells us nothing about the Sun moving or not moving - am I wrong to infer that the normal state of affairs did change in this instance? Or should I, since the inspired recorder of the events did not tell us that the Sun had anything to do with it, just assume that the shadow moved without anything else happening?


----------



## Prufrock

*[Moderator]
I am by no means locking this thread down, but I may suggest that we all slow down a bit and take a breather. This is by far the "fastest moving" thread I have seen so far on the PB, and it seems to be creating much in the way of reading too quickly, and thus it can lead to either 1.) Missing what is being said, or 2.) Leaping to conclusions.
[/Moderator]*


----------



## MW

P. F. Pugh said:


> I am not calling this passage allegory, just suggesting that maybe it doesn't demand a geocentric interpretation.



I know you are not calling this passage allegory. You are interpreting it in an allegorical manner. The text says, Sun, and you say, Earth. That is allegory, where you substitute a literal referent for a figurative one which accords with your reason.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> If Joshua had said, "2+2=5" (for whatever reason), and an inspired author had written, "And then Joshua said, '2+2=5,'" the author would still have written inerrantly, but Joshua would have spoken errantly.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> But, to follow through on your analogy, the inspired writer effectively says, "God made 2+2=5, in answer to His servant," and that is what the allegorists refuse to accept.
Click to expand...

That's fine, I can see the logic there. My intention was only to point out that your accusation against Sarah was a bit rash.

On another note, given that you are approaching this from an exegetical perspective alone (which is fine; I'm not saying it's not), do you have a resource that we could read providing an answer to my second question above, for those who wish to see the scientific explanation?


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> I've never studied this in detail, but would there be a problem with assuming a difference between conceptions - take the wedding at Cana for instance. There is a difference between the Cosmological conceptions of the people of the Old Testament and the conceptions which would lead one to believe that "wine is wine and will always be wine", isn't there?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sorry, Vaughan, I'm struggling to understand the question. Are you asking if the conceptions of the people are more instrumental in the OT than in Cana, or something else?
Click to expand...

No, sorry I was unclear. 

What I asked was in response to you stating that positing _any_ "misconception" on the part of the one seeing the miracle is untenable, as it opens the door to a liberal interpretation of miraculous events. I put forward that it might be helpful to make a distinction between conceptions of reality - for instance, the positive cosmological view held by saints throughout the Bible, and the assumption of uniformity held by those saints who witnessed a miracle.

For instance, in application to those who witnessed the miracle in Joshua's case, we have this:

Positive view: A cosmological view that creation is geocentric.
Assumption of uniformity: The sun never stops moving through the sky.

In the miracle, the assumption of uniformity is challenged. Just as in the miracles of the New Testament, the disciples'/onlookers' assumptions of uniformity were challenged. This doesn't mean though that their positive cosmological views were correct in the first place. 

Thus we may preserve the miraculous happenings throughout Scripture (contra liberalism), whilst holding a different view of cosmology held by those who witnessed them (contra, in this case, geocentricism).

Note: This is all speculation. It also doesn't touch on the exegetical comments you have already posted. Just some thoughts.


----------



## MW

austinww said:


> On another note, given that you are approaching this from an exegetical perspective alone (which is fine; I'm not saying it's not), do you have a resource that we could read providing an answer to my second question above, for those who wish to see the scientific explanation?



You will have to ask the scientists for such resources.


----------



## charliejunfan

WOW, I never thought that I would question whether or not the earth revolves around the sun or not. You people are so learned, it's incredible!!! I thank God that there are you people out there who take the time to study scripture this deeply.


----------



## Edward

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> I am disagreeing over the vantage point and not over the fact that the event happened.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> No, you are disagreeing with *what* stood still. The Bible says *what* stood still, and you do not accept it.
Click to expand...


Well, if the sun stood still, and the earth continued to move, then the sun would have still appeared to be in motion to the folks observing it.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> Thus we may preserve the miraculous happenings throughout Scripture (contra liberalism), whilst holding a different view of cosmology held by those who witnessed them (contra, in this case, geocentricism).



OK. I think I understand now. Here is the problem -- what is a miracle? If we define it as a work which transcends the ordinary operations of providence then it is obvious that one must have a correct view of "nature" in order to know when a miracle has taken place. If the biblical writers/readers were mistaken as to the way the world works then there is no way of knowing that something over and above the ordinary course of providence has taken place.


----------



## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Montanablue said:
> 
> 
> 
> The inspired writer is reporting Joshua's prayer. Joshua's prayer itself is not necessarily inspired.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And I have repeatedly made the point that Joshua's prayer is instrumental in the miracle. "And there was no day like that before it or after it, that *the LORD hearkened unto the voice of a man*: for the LORD fought for Israel." To cast doubt on the factuality of the prayer or the event is to cast doubt on the miracle. To cast doubt on the narration of these is to cast doubt on the plenary inspiration of the Bible.
Click to expand...


I hear what you are saying, but lets suppose a slight change....

Suppose the earth does go around the sun, and I being a man from 4000 years ago just don't know that .... I ask God to make the sun stand still so we can defeat the enemy more completely. Do you think that God would understand what I was saying, even if I was saying it "wrong" and then use the language of the day to convey the truth regardless of the events in the big perspective? Or do you think that God would sit in heaven and dismiss the prayer for not forming it properly from a heliocentric solar system point of view and tell Joshua "Sorry bub, you didn't ask me properly and you just don't understand the planetary physics involved, so no, not only do I not make the sun stand still, but I don't extend the day through have the rotation of the earth miraculously stopped for a time."

My point is that if the heliocentric model is accurate (and not the geocentric) there would be NO difference in the text of scripture. There is no need for it (even I would, knowing the heliocentric nature of the solar system) if I were in the same situation would ask for the sun to stand still rather than go through all the appropriate planetary physics of "stop the earth, while suspending the inertial forces that are tied to objects in motion staying in motion, then start the rotation later after we defeat the enemy and then suspend yet again the inertial forces that would keep object on the surface at rest as the Earth starts spinning again." If the text would not of necessity change between either one being real, then the text does not support or deny either one.


----------



## MW

Edward said:


> Well, if the sun stood still, and the earth continued to move, then the sun would have still appeared to be in motion to the folks observing it.



Yet another non-biblical consideration. Whence in the Bible do you derive the idea that the earth moves? If you do not derive it from the Bible then you have no right to impose it on the biblical text.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> Thus we may preserve the miraculous happenings throughout Scripture (contra liberalism), whilst holding a different view of cosmology held by those who witnessed them (contra, in this case, geocentricism).
> 
> 
> 
> 
> OK. I think I understand now. Here is the problem -- what is a miracle? If we define it as a work which transcends the ordinary operations of providence then it is obvious that one must have a correct view of "nature" in order to know when a miracle has taken place. If the biblical writers/readers were mistaken as to the way the world works then there is no way of knowing that something over and above the ordinary course of providence has taken place.
Click to expand...

Not so. For either the geocentric or the heliocentric model, if you see the sun sit still in the sky, it is abundantly clear a miracle has taken place, whether the sun miraculously stopped moving or the earth miraculously stopped moving. In either model, the sun does not make a habit of just stopping on its own.


----------



## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> Do you think that God would understand what I was saying, even if I was saying it "wrong" and then use the language of the day to convey the truth regardless of the events in the big perspective?



Sure, God is big enough that He can do anything. But I am also sure He is wise enough to know that if He accommodated errors there would be no way for believers to know when He was telling truth and when He was accommodating error, to the point there could be no certainty about any fact.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> Thus we may preserve the miraculous happenings throughout Scripture (contra liberalism), whilst holding a different view of cosmology held by those who witnessed them (contra, in this case, geocentricism).
> 
> 
> 
> 
> OK. I think I understand now. Here is the problem -- what is a miracle? If we define it as a work which transcends the ordinary operations of providence then it is obvious that one must have a correct view of "nature" in order to know when a miracle has taken place. If the biblical writers/readers were mistaken as to the way the world works then there is no way of knowing that something over and above the ordinary course of providence has taken place.
Click to expand...

I think the distinction still guards against this. In the end, a miracle is regarded as a miracle not because it goes against any kind of "law of nature", but because God chooses to work in a different way to the way that He has worked previously. A miracle is miraculous to the witness because it challenges the "assumption of uniformity." I think that the distinction also maintains the difference between the knowledge, for instance, that a dead man cannot rise again, and the knowledge that the earth is the centre of the universe/galaxy. One is an assumption through experience and evidence, whilst the other is a theory that cannot be verified through experience. 

 My brain is trying hard to express itself.


----------



## MW

austinww said:


> Not so. For either the geocentric or the heliocentric model, if you see the sun sit still in the sky, it is abundantly clear a miracle has taken place, whether the sun miraculously stopped moving or the earth miraculously stopped moving. In either model, the sun does not make a habit of just stopping on its own.



Upon whose testimony are you asserting that a miracle took place? That would be the testimony of the one whose knowledge of universal systems you are calling into doubt. Hmmm. The author says, the sun stood still. You want to replace the sun with the earth. But then you still want to say that he was correct about the standing still.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

I might bow out for a little while, see how things go. For Matthew's sake, I hate it when I'm defending/interacting on three to four fronts!


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> In the end, a miracle is regarded as a miracle not because it goes against any kind of "law of nature", but because God chooses to work in a different way to the way that He has worked previously.



Well, let's redefine miracle to "accommodate" your explanation. How does the person recording the miracle know that it is a *different* way, when it is alleged he didn't properly understand the previous way? The miracle may have been nothing more than a normal complexity the narrator couldn't understand.


----------



## VaughanRSmith

armourbearer said:


> Exagorazo said:
> 
> 
> 
> In the end, a miracle is regarded as a miracle not because it goes against any kind of "law of nature", but because God chooses to work in a different way to the way that He has worked previously.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Well, let's redefine miracle to "accommodate" your explanation. How does the person recording the miracle know that it is a *different* way, when it is alleged he didn't properly understand the previous way? The miracle may have been nothing more than a normal complexity the narrator couldn't understand.
Click to expand...

For starters, we can say that history has shown it to be true. 

Secondly we, as the readers of this miracle, don't find the significance of the miracle in the way that it challenged the assumptions of the day, but in the way that it challenges _our own_ assumptions. We know that the sun doesn't just stop, and give us extra hours in the day. But our assumptions are challenged, just as they were for Joshua and his fellow witnesses, because we assume that things don't just happen that way. This isn't, in the end, a question of cosmology, but of assumptions. 

For instance, the disciples wouldn't know about how the surface tension of water worked, or exactly how light Jesus would have to be before he broke the meniscus of the lake, but they did know that no human can walk on water. They didn't need a full blown understanding of the chemical makeup of water in order to recognise a miracle, and neither do we.


----------



## Vytautas

armourbearer,

It seems you want to guard against the interpretaion which says that the earth actually stood still, while the sun appeared to stand still. But you subsittute the vantage point of the people that look at the sun with the earth itself. The sun stood still due to the prayer of Joshua, so that he is the vantage point and not the earth.


----------



## au5t1n

Exagorazo said:


> I might bow out for a little while, see how things go. For Matthew's sake, I hate it when I'm defending/interacting on three to four fronts!



I shouldn't have interrupted the flow of your conversation. Please do not feel the need to step out if it is related to my interruption. I'm done for now. Sorry. 



armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> Not so. For either the geocentric or the heliocentric model, if you see the sun sit still in the sky, it is abundantly clear a miracle has taken place, whether the sun miraculously stopped moving or the earth miraculously stopped moving. In either model, the sun does not make a habit of just stopping on its own.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Upon whose testimony are you asserting that a miracle took place? That would be the testimony of the one whose knowledge of universal systems you are calling into doubt. Hmmm. The author says, the sun stood still. You want to replace the sun with the earth. But then you still want to say that he was correct about the standing still.
Click to expand...


I don't think I can answer that beyond what has already been stated by others better than I can restate it. I do believe that the sun DID stand still in the sky. It was not moving in the sky. That is a fact that is just as true in the heliocentric model. Your view actually demands a continuous miracle throughout all history because it is a violation of both the law of gravity and Newton's Third Law of Motion for a more massive body to revolve around a less massive one.

I have to go to bed, but I have enjoyed reading this discussion, including your part in it. I look forward to reading the rest of this discussion when I have time, and I hope it continues to be profitable.


----------



## MW

Exagorazo said:


> We know that the sun doesn't just stop, and give us extra hours in the day. But our assumptions are challenged, just as they were for Joshua and his fellow witnesses, because we assume that things don't just happen that way.



OK. But then the text is also obviously challenging our assumption that the earth revolves around the sun. Why are we at liberty to disregard this challenge? And if we can disregard this challenge, why could not Joshua's contemporaries disregard certain things which would have challenged them? In the end, we would end up merely reading assumptions and challenges into the text rather than simply reading the text as it stands.


----------



## MW

Vytautas said:


> The sun stood still due to the prayer of Joshua, so that he is the vantage point and not the earth.



God is the vantage point. He answered His servant's prayer. If God was simply accommodating Joshua's misconception, then who knows what is true!


----------



## MW

austinww said:


> Your view actually demands a continuous miracle throughout all history because it is a violation of both the law of gravity and Newton's Third Law of Motion for a more massive body to revolve around a less massive one.



And here I was thinking Newton was trying to understand God's works, not vice versa.


----------



## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> Do you think that God would understand what I was saying, even if I was saying it "wrong" and then use the language of the day to convey the truth regardless of the events in the big perspective?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sure, God is big enough that He can do anything. But I am also sure He is wise enough to know that if He accommodated errors there would be no way for believers to know when He was telling truth and when He was accommodating error, to the point there could be no certainty about any fact.
Click to expand...


So if God uses figurative speech anywhere, we have no certainty about anything?

Like I said, regardless of which view is correct, it would be expressed the same way. The Bible is not a science text, and you are attempting to make it speak in those terms when it says the sun stood still (i.e., that it could not be as I would say "the sun stood still in the sky" knowing full well that it would not be the sun standing still).

Again, if Joshua asked (even if he knew the earth actually rotates) for the sun to stand still, would the Bible have recorded it that way, or recorded it the way it does? Would the longer, more drawn out words while being closer to the physical reality have done any more good at communicating what the passage wants to communicate than "the sun stood still in the sky for about a day"? The only difference would be in the realm of physics, not in what I believe God is interested in communicating through that passage of scripture.

When I say the sun will rise at 6:36 tomorrow morning, I am wrong if the heliocentric model is correct? Or should I say "the Earth's rotation will allow the first direct light from the sun to appear over the horizon tomorrow at 6:36" in order to be precise from a scientific standpoint? Asking the later is ridiculous ... insisting that God would word scripture so that it does not use figurative speech that we use even to this day just to answer scientific questions that we can discover through ordinary means is to demand that God reveal what we want revealed instead of reveal what he wants to reveal in his own way.

Suppose that God wanted to accomplish what happened without revealing the heliocentric nature of the solar system to those he wanted to reveal the supernatural event of extending the day. How would it be expressed? If you cannot answer that, then are you saying that God had to answer both questions or he could not have answered the one he cares to answer? If those that saw the phenomena of the "sun standing still in the sky" and it really was the earth stopping rotation, how would you expect them to have described it?

You seem to want to force the text to have spoken scientifically ... that the "facts" had to be scientific facts rather than what was observed. I have to believe that if that is the case, you hold to a flat Earth? (corners of the earth ... facts are facts?)


----------



## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Vytautas said:
> 
> 
> 
> The sun stood still due to the prayer of Joshua, so that he is the vantage point and not the earth.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> God is the vantage point. He answered His servant's prayer. If God was simply accommodating Joshua's misconception, then who knows what is true!
Click to expand...


God does. You and I don't.


----------



## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> So if God uses figurative speech anywhere, we have no certainty about anything?



First you said it was a matter of accommodating misconception. Now you are saying it is not an accommodation, but that it utilises figurative language. Well, the figurative language angle is clearly negated by the fact that Joshua prayed for the sun to stand still, and God answered the prayer in terms of the sun standing still. There are no figurative markers in the text. And, finally, it is clear that external considerations raised by secular science are being thrust upon the interpretation of the text.


----------



## au5t1n

armourbearer said:


> austinww said:
> 
> 
> 
> Your view actually demands a continuous miracle throughout all history because it is a violation of both the law of gravity and Newton's Third Law of Motion for a more massive body to revolve around a less massive one.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And here I was thinking Newton was trying to understand God's works, not vice versa.
Click to expand...

Touché.

By the way, I edited my last post because I don't believe I was right to make unnecessary assumptions about your motivations on previous posts. Sorry about that. Have a good evening.

Austin


----------



## ChristianTrader

Great Mathematician Bertrand Russell:

"Before Copernicus, people thought that the earth stood still and that the heavens revolved about it once a day. Copernicus taught that "really" the earth revolves once a day, and the daily rotation of sun and stars is only "apparent"... But in the modern theory the question between Copernicus and his predecessors is merely one of convenience; all motion is relative, and there is no difference between the two... Astronomy is easier if we take the sun as fixed than if we take the earth... But to say more for Copernicus is to assume absolute motion, which is a fiction. It is a mere convention to take one body as at rest. All such conventions are equally legitimate, though not all are equally convenient." Russell "The ABC of Relativity [ London: Allen & Unwin, 1958, p.13].

I think a YEC Creationist has an incredibly difficult time denying Geocentrism. Geocentrism has an even better pedigree in church history than YEC, and YEC has a good pedigree. The Reformers, had no problem properly interpreting the "God has wings" and the "flat earth" passages while firmly maintaining their geocentrism. This seems to imply that their hermeneutics was a bit more nuanced than some want to give them credit for having.

What I also find interesting is how much ambiguity passages where no ambiguity was found for the first thousand+ years of church history all of a sudden has ambiguity all over it when "Science" starts to bark. First it was geocentrism, then 6 day creationism, then homosexuality etc. etc.

I am not accusing anyone of secretly being a liberal but this 500 year progression is frightening.

CT


----------



## Brian Withnell

Joshua said:


> Isn't it safe to say that, despite our modern sensibilities, the narration here is not saying what _appeared_ to happen, but what _actually_ happened? I mean, the narrator doesn't say, "The earth stood still." It says that the sun stood still. It doesn't say it just _appeared_ that the sun stood still, or that _apparently_ the sun stood still, but that, _in fact_, the sun stood still. That seems to be a statement of fact, and not one of _appearance_.
> 
> 
> ????
> 
> I dunno.



Why would the writer have said it that way unless he knew the Earth rotated, and the sun was the center of the solar system? If the Bible is not a science book, why would it use even the clarifying term that we don't use even today when the general consensus is that the Earth rotates?

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 11:43:32 EST-----



armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> So if God uses figurative speech anywhere, we have no certainty about anything?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> First you said it was a matter of accommodating misconception. Now you are saying it is not an accommodation, but that it utilises figurative language. Well, the figurative language angle is clearly negated by the fact that Joshua prayed for the sun to stand still, and God answered the prayer in terms of the sun standing still. There are no figurative markers in the text. And, finally, it is clear that external considerations raised by secular science are being thrust upon the interpretation of the text.
Click to expand...


If God says it figuratively, and Joshua said it with misconception, both are still in the text. What one might demand for figurative markers doesn't matter. If God said it so they would understand it, and yet it is figurative because we know it so, then demanding that God should have said it differently so it makes sense scientifically is not what we are able to demand of God.

As I said before, *I* would have prayed the same way today even though I believe the Earth rotates. That being the case, demanding that I would have prayed using figurative markers is just beyond credulity. There is no reason to believe there would be any change in the text even if Joshua knew the Earth rotated ... it would still convey the exact same message.


----------



## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> If God says it figuratively, and Joshua said it with misconception, both are still in the text. What one might demand for figurative markers doesn't matter. If God said it so they would understand it, and yet it is figurative because we know it so, then demanding that God should have said it differently so it makes sense scientifically is not what we are able to demand of God.



The spanner in your works comes in the fact that there is no shift between (1.) Joshua's prayer, (2.) God's answer to the prayer, and (3.) The inspired narrator's statement of fact. From each and every perspective, the sun stood still. In a fight between the text and the interpreter the text wins every time. Just concede!


----------



## Grillsy

armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> If God says it figuratively, and Joshua said it with misconception, both are still in the text. What one might demand for figurative markers doesn't matter. If God said it so they would understand it, and yet it is figurative because we know it so, then demanding that God should have said it differently so it makes sense scientifically is not what we are able to demand of God.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The spanner in your works comes in the fact that there is no shift between (1.) Joshua's prayer, (2.) God's answer to the prayer, and (3.) The inspired narrator's statement of fact. From each and every perspective, the sun stood still. In a fight between the text and the interpreter the text wins every time. Just concede!
Click to expand...


I will ask a question in this way. If the sun doesn't move how does it stop? Why are you unwilling to consider another opinion on the Joshua texts? No one is being liberal, as it is mildly being asserted. Why will you not address the issue of perception?


----------



## Mushroom

> *Why would the writer have said it that way unless he knew the Earth rotated*, and the sun was the center of the solar system? If the Bible is not a science book, why would it use even the clarifying term that we don't use even today when the general consensus is that the Earth rotates?


The Holy Spirit didn't know whether the Earth rotates or not when He inspired this passage? Wow. Good thing modern science has come along to properly educate Him!

Sorry Brian, no offense intended, but sometimes I think we're too easily blinded by the careful subtleties of mankind's attempts to deny the truth of God's Word.

-----Added 11/1/2009 at 11:58:12 EST-----



> If the sun doesn't move how does it stop?


Did I miss where someone said the Sun does not move?


----------



## Grillsy

Brad said:


> *Why would the writer have said it that way unless he knew the Earth rotated*, and the sun was the center of the solar system? If the Bible is not a science book, why would it use even the clarifying term that we don't use even today when the general consensus is that the Earth rotates?
> 
> 
> 
> The Holy Spirit didn't know whether the Earth rotates or not when He inspired this passage? Wow. Good thing modern science has come along to properly educate Him!
> 
> Sorry Brian, no offense intended, but sometimes I think we're too easily blinded by the careful subtleties of mankind's attempts to deny the truth of God's Word.
Click to expand...


It is not a question of whether or not the Holy Spirit knew that earth revolved around the sun. It boils down to the fact that the text of Joshua is thousands of years removed from us. Perception in reality and in language must be considered. 

I think that our accusation again Brian is unfounded. I could just as easily have accused you of having a not so subtle attempt at avoiding study of a physics text. 

The fact of the matter is that the earth revolves around the sun. Go read up on this absolute fact.

And yes the sun does move, it rotates on its axis about once every twenty five Earth days. It could also be argued the sun revolves around the Milky Way.


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## Igor

Hm... I am far from being a Liberal in interpreting the Bible, so is my Church (the Russian Baptists are traditionaly very conservative), but if I tried to preach something like this (I mean, that it is the sun that orbits the Earth) from the pulpit, I think that with all respect my congregation has to me as a teacher, that will be my last sermon. (I am not sure they will collect some money to send me to a resort, but that would be a proper thing to do, I believe...)
Guys, are you serious?!


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## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> If God says it figuratively, and Joshua said it with misconception, both are still in the text. What one might demand for figurative markers doesn't matter. If God said it so they would understand it, and yet it is figurative because we know it so, then demanding that God should have said it differently so it makes sense scientifically is not what we are able to demand of God.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The spanner in your works comes in the fact that there is no shift between (1.) Joshua's prayer, (2.) God's answer to the prayer, and (3.) The inspired narrator's statement of fact. From each and every perspective, the sun stood still. In a fight between the text and the interpreter the text wins every time. Just concede!
Click to expand...


The text speaks in terms understandable to persons at the time (all three, Joshua's prayer, God's answer, and the narrator). And it is perfectly understandable today even as we know the truth more clearly (and yet would still use the exact same language). You are arguing that the text cannot state what it states in a manner which does not answer the question you want answered. You are demanding that it speak how you would want it to speak. I'm not demanding it say anything other than Joshua asked (in the way he could) for the day to be extended, that God answered (in the way Joshua would understand) and the narrator stated the same in the way that people of the time would understand.

What I see you doing is demanding that if the heliocentric model is true, and that what happened in the big picture was the change of rotation of the earth, that it would have somehow had to have been communicated. I hit the buzz, wrong question being asked of scripture button ... if the concept was not known, then the question answered would not be the one that contains the concept, and the expressions used would have been the most natural to the people of the day.

The question remains, if there was no concept of rotation of the Earth, how would they have expressed it? "Appeared to stand still" would have made no sense as the person of the day.

Joshua would certainly have asked for the sun to stand still. And God would condescend to answer in the terms the question was asked, and the narrator, having no more knowledge than Joshua, would have expressed the same thing. The passage does not loose anything if it does not talk to the physical motions involved, but states them uniformly as what would be observed. If the same thing happened today, it would probably be described the same way even if the writer believed in rotation of the earth.


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## Mushroom

Grillsy said:


> Brad said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> *Why would the writer have said it that way unless he knew the Earth rotated*, and the sun was the center of the solar system? If the Bible is not a science book, why would it use even the clarifying term that we don't use even today when the general consensus is that the Earth rotates?
> 
> 
> 
> The Holy Spirit didn't know whether the Earth rotates or not when He inspired this passage? Wow. Good thing modern science has come along to properly educate Him!
> 
> Sorry Brian, no offense intended, but sometimes I think we're too easily blinded by the careful subtleties of mankind's attempts to deny the truth of God's Word.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> It is not a question of whether or not the Holy Spirit knew that earth revolved around the sun. It boils down to the fact that the text of Joshua is thousands of years removed from us. Perception in reality and in language must be considered.
> 
> I think that our accusation again Brian is unfounded. I could just as easily have accused you of having a not so subtle attempt at avoiding study a physics text.
> 
> The fact of the matter is that the earth revolves around the sun. Go read up on this absolute fact.
> 
> And yes the sun does move, it rotates on its axis about once every twenty five Earth days. It could also be argued the sun revolves around the Milky Way.
Click to expand...

Dear brother, I have made no accusation against my other very dear brother Brian. I simply used a bit of sarcasm to point out an inconsistency in his statement.

Rev. Winzer has done a fine job of explaining to you why your assertion of 'absolute fact' is not so absolutely factual as your physics prof alleged, so I will digress to his far superior understanding of these matters. There are a few other theories asserted as 'absolute fact' at your friendly ivory tower that may be a tad askew of scripture, so I'd recommend a careful approach to them.


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## MW

Grillsy said:


> If the sun doesn't move how does it stop?



This makes absolutely no sense in the context of our discussion!


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## Grillsy

armourbearer said:


> Grillsy said:
> 
> 
> 
> If the sun doesn't move how does it stop?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This makes absolutely no sense in the context of our discussion!
Click to expand...


Sorry about that. That was an editing mistake on my part.

-----Added 11/2/2009 at 12:16:41 EST-----



Brad said:


> Grillsy said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Brad said:
> 
> 
> 
> The Holy Spirit didn't know whether the Earth rotates or not when He inspired this passage? Wow. Good thing modern science has come along to properly educate Him!
> 
> Sorry Brian, no offense intended, but sometimes I think we're too easily blinded by the careful subtleties of mankind's attempts to deny the truth of God's Word.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It is not a question of whether or not the Holy Spirit knew that earth revolved around the sun. It boils down to the fact that the text of Joshua is thousands of years removed from us. Perception in reality and in language must be considered.
> 
> I think that our accusation again Brian is unfounded. I could just as easily have accused you of having a not so subtle attempt at avoiding study a physics text.
> 
> The fact of the matter is that the earth revolves around the sun. Go read up on this absolute fact.
> 
> And yes the sun does move, it rotates on its axis about once every twenty five Earth days. It could also be argued the sun revolves around the Milky Way.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Dear brother, I have made no accusation against my other very dear brother Brian. I simply used a bit of sarcasm to point out an inconsistency in his statement.
> 
> Rev. Winzer has done a fine job of explaining to you why your assertion of 'absolute fact' is not so absolutely factual as your physics prof alleged, so I will digress to his far superior understanding of these matters. There are a few other theories asserted as 'absolute fact' at your friendly ivory tower that may be a tad askew of scripture, so I'd recommend a careful approach to them.
Click to expand...


It is an absolute fact. It has been proven and observed. You also fail to deal with Brian's arguments.


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## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> and the narrator, having no more knowledge than Joshua, would have expressed the same thing.



I already addressed the issue of plenary inspiration earlier in the thread. As noted there, if you don't believe in it this is not the forum for you.


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## Mushroom

Zenas said:


> armourbearer said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Edward said:
> 
> 
> 
> Well, if the sun stood still, and the earth continued to move, then the sun would have still appeared to be in motion to the folks observing it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yet another non-biblical consideration. Whence in the Bible do you derive the idea that the earth moves? If you do not derive it from the Bible then you have no right to impose it on the biblical text.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> Where does the Bible say that the sky is blue, that ice melts if it rises above 32 degrees F, or that dolphins have hair?
> 
> I feel that further sarcasm would only be beating a dead horse.
Click to expand...

Andrew, I don't believe Matthew was being sarcastic. I, however, definitely was, so if any dead horses need beating, it would be me.

Scripture does not address those other topics, but it does this one.


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## MW

Zenas said:


> Where does the Bible say that the sky is blue



Matthew 16:3, it says the sky might be red. Thankfully scientists are not so ignorant as to actually say the sky is blue. If they did, we would have to accept the Bible and leave the scientists to learn better in the future, as is the case with absolute heliocentric claims.


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## Brian Withnell

Brad said:


> *Why would the writer have said it that way unless he knew the Earth rotated*, and the sun was the center of the solar system? If the Bible is not a science book, why would it use even the clarifying term that we don't use even today when the general consensus is that the Earth rotates?
> 
> 
> 
> The Holy Spirit didn't know whether the Earth rotates or not when He inspired this passage? Wow. Good thing modern science has come along to properly educate Him!
> 
> Sorry Brian, no offense intended, but sometimes I think we're too easily blinded by the careful subtleties of mankind's attempts to deny the truth of God's Word.
> ?
Click to expand...


Brad, of course the Holy Spirit knows, and there are plenty of people that believe the Bible is absolutely true, but look at the physical attributes of what happened here in the context of what the writer could have expressed (meaning the human writer). The Spirit did not override the person who wrote the text and make them an automaton and move their hands such that they wrote that of which they had no concept. The scripture does not speak of quantum mechanics, relativity, or anything else that God placed into the workings of the universe that do not connect to the plan of salvation. All of the books were written by men with understanding of the words they used ... all but those passages that were visions. (If we view historical narrative as testimony of a person in that time and place writing what he actually saw, we have a much better chance of understanding the passage than if we attempt to view it as a modern reader would.)

There is no disregard for the truth of scripture, but only a refusal to view the Bible as if it were a scientific textbook. If I would write the same way, even being sure of rotation of the Earth, then the Bible is not wrong in saying the same things even if it is not answering the question being asked.

-----Added 11/2/2009 at 12:52:28 EST-----



armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> and the narrator, having no more knowledge than Joshua, would have expressed the same thing.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I already addressed the issue of plenary inspiration earlier in the thread. As noted there, if you don't believe in it this is not the forum for you.
Click to expand...


As I'm sure you know, I hold fully to the OPC version of the WCF, but that might mean that I do not hold to automaton inspiration (at least the OPC has not gone down that path to my knowledge, and my view has been open to my session from day one).

I hold to the infallibility of scripture, but I don't necessarily believe you know the single true interpretation of scripture for every passage. (Nor that you would hold the only possible orthodox view of plenary inspiration.) That there is no defect in the text does not mean that it speaks to the question you ask of it. It is not forced to answer what you are saying it answers, and yet is without error and impossible to fail.

All I'm claiming is that just because you want it to mean more than what it could mean doesn't mean that it has to.

What you have not answered is that if I (or anyone from a heliocentric view) would state the passage the exact same way, how does it force only what you are saying the interpretation can only be? (If the expression is the same regardless, then there is no error, and the passage does not speak to planetary physics.)


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## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> I hold to the infallibility of scripture, but I don't necessarily believe you know the single true interpretation of scripture for every passage.



Every reformed exposition of the doctrine of inspiration I have read at least includes within it an affirmation that the errors of the penmen were suppressed. I don't need to know the single true interpretation of every passage in order to affirm the reformed doctrine of plenary inspiration. If you want to teach otherwise, take it elsewhere. This point is not open to debate.


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## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> I hold to the infallibility of scripture, but I don't necessarily believe you know the single true interpretation of scripture for every passage.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Every reformed exposition of the doctrine of inspiration I have read at least includes within it an affirmation that the errors of the penmen were suppressed. I don't need to know the single true interpretation of every passage in order to affirm the reformed doctrine of plenary inspiration. If you want to teach otherwise, take it elsewhere. This point is not open to debate.
Click to expand...


And I fully agree with that. It has no bearing on this passage.

added for clarification
I fully agree suppression of error of the person would be there. I just disagree that the passage says *anything* about planetary physics. If I were there, I would have prayed even as Joshua did. I fully believe God would have answered exactly the same way (in saying the sun would stop). And anyone reporting it (the narrator) would report the sun stopped in the sky. Regardless of planetary physics.

That is what I think you are missing. There would be no difference between the expressions regardless of the physics of the universe.


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## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> And I fully agree with that. It has no bearing on this passage.



Then you need to rephrase your statement: "and the narrator, having no more knowledge than Joshua, would have expressed the same thing." Here you affirm that the narrator's lack of knowledge found its way into the text of Scripture.

You also need to correct your sceptical statement that you and I don't know what is true because God accommodated Himself to Joshua's misconception.


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## Brian Withnell

armourbearer said:


> Brian Withnell said:
> 
> 
> 
> And I fully agree with that. It has no bearing on this passage.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Then you need to rephrase your statement: "and the narrator, having no more knowledge than Joshua, would have expressed the same thing." Here you affirm that the narrator's lack of knowledge found its way into the text of Scripture.
> 
> You also need to correct your sceptical statement that you and I don't know what is true because God accommodated Himself to Joshua's misconception.
Click to expand...


Last post on this.

What I'm saying is that the passage says _absolutely nothing_ about planetary physics.

The passage does not differentiate between heliocentric and geocentric views of the solar system, as a reasonable person would not change the language regardless of which position he held.

That is what I think you just are not seeing. What I believe you are doing is trying to force fit this to what does not hold up for all passages (are you really a flat Earther?)

-----Added 11/2/2009 at 01:31:31 EST-----



armourbearer said:


> You also need to correct your sceptical statement that you and I don't know what is true because God accommodated Himself to Joshua's misconception.



I certainly had hoped I was done, but I did want to address this...

I did not make myself clear. Regardless of what is true, I do not believe we know fully what is true (it had nothing to do with accommodation to error on Joshua's part). There is a huge difference between what we know and what God knows. All of what we know is based on what God knows and has allowed us to know. Therefore, I stated that we (you and I) do not know what is true, but God does. (We can only know in part, and what we know we know only through the veil of sin that still remains in this age. In the age to come, what we know will be perfect, if not complete.)


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## MW

Brian Withnell said:


> That is what I think you just are not seeing. What I believe you are doing is trying to force fit this to what does not hold up for all passages (are you really a flat Earther?)



No; I am simply allowing the Bible to say what it says. The passage obviously does not teach us physics, astronomy, or any other science; but the passage makes a statement about the sun, that it ordinarily moves, and that a miracle occurred when it stopped moving. Whatever one thinks about physics, astronomy, or any other science, he has no right to impose his unproven, ever advancing scientific explanations on the Bible and make it say something other than what it says.



Brian Withnell said:


> Therefore, I stated that we (you and I) do not know what is true, but God does.



Well, one thing is for sure, you will never be able to say with any degree of certainty that anything is true on the basis that the Bible teaches it while you allow that the Bible accommodates its teaching to the mistaken notions of men. Your doctrine of inspiration is not reformed so long as you do not consider the suppression of the penmen's errors to be an active part of it. You will simply never know what is absolute truth and what is mere accommodation. Like the liberal, the canon of reason is required to distinguish where Scripture speaks truth and where it accommodates error.


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## dr_parsley

Say to any scientist that a celestial body stopped moving and their first question will be, "relative to what?"

Scientist A: The sun stopped moving.
Scientist B: Relative to what?
Scientist A: Relative to the earth.
Scientist B: How did it do that?
Scientist A: There were outside forces exerting on the system. (from God).

End of story. Science and the bible can easily agree - it is irrelevant to the issue whether one conceives of the sun moving around the earth or the earth rotating.


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## JennyG

P. F. Pugh said:


> I must say that unbelievers who read this thread are going to be laughing that we even debate this stuff.


I'm on my way out to work and this thread has moved on quite a lot, and into much better hands, overnight...!
This post caught my eye though, and of course it's true.
Similar worries got in my way for a long time when I was thinking about 6-day Creation.

But THE question is, should that *ever* be a consideration?? You can see where that's leading.


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## Skyler

Armourbearer, how should the passage in Joshua 10 read if the heliocentric model were correct?

edit: Specifically, if it is to be understandable to the greatest number of people, regardless of their cosmology?


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## ChristianTrader

*Thoughts from a Math Professor in British Columbia*

Byl on Galileo | Geocentricity | Scripture & Science | Reformation International College


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## TimV

Does anyone know how geocentrists explain why missile tracking/launching programs have the movement of the earth around the sun built into them?


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## Skyler

TimV said:


> Does anyone know how geocentrists explain why missile tracking/launching programs have the movement of the earth around the sun built into them?



The movement of the earth around the sun and the movement of the sun around the earth should yield the same mathematic trajectory. There shouldn't really be a difference.

-----Added 11/2/2009 at 08:10:41 EST-----



lynnie said:


> skyler....I really mean it when I say that I appreciate you trying to understand where I am coming from. Its like a credo-paedo debate where somebody actually tries to understand the other side. I mean, my poor PCA pastor has had people in his life tell him he must not have ever read the bible if he believes in infant baptism. God will use you greatly in ministry if you try and be the kind of person who attempts to understand the other side. I've gotten tired of the " flat earth" cracks over the years. So thank you.
> 
> you said: _Basically, they were testing to see if the Earth's velocity would make a difference in the speed of light--and it didn't, confirming Einstein's hypothesis._
> 
> Actually, chronologically it is the other way around. In 1887 M/M showed that there was no velocity of the earth. In 1905 Einstein published his theory. So yes indeed, the MM experiment confirms Einsteins hypothesis IF and only if you are heliocentric and need a way to explain why the earth appears to not have a velocity. If you are geo, you don't need the theory of relativity.



M/M showed that there was no "ether wind". This means either that the earth was not moving through the ether, or the earth was moving and the ether did not exist. If you don't believe in the ether, then it doesn't show that the Earth is stationary.



> Like I said, both models work. The real scientific ( not scripture) debate in my opinion must come down to relativity- proven or debunked. You must accept that visible light behaves differently than any other measured wave velocity of the electromagnetic spectrum.



No, I don't think that's the case. Relativity applies to all frequencies of electromagnetic radiation, not just the visible wavelengths. Could you explain what you mean by that?



> You have to accept that as the earth revolves around the Sun at a speed of about thirty kilometers per second, if we repeat the experiment six months later, we should expect to find a difference of sixty kilometers per second, as the Earth moves away from the particular star's light. And it does not. So either Einsten is right and visible light behaves differently than radar, x-rays, radio waves, microwaves, etc, or, the earth stands still.



The M/M experiment isn't measuring the speed of light coming from a distant star. It's measuring the speed of light coming from a single source within the experiment itself. I think that might be where we're getting mixed up.



> By the way geocentrists do believe in the ether. They call it the firmament. All the heavenly bodies exist in something invisible but "firm." I am not sure if the dark matter theories are the same thing. Guess I need to go read up the geocentric sites one of these days. Been a while.



Then, theoretically, if we repeat the M/M experiment on the moon, geocentrism would predict that we should get different results than on the earth, because the moon actually is moving through the ether. Right?


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## TimV

> (I can't believe I am even having to debate this, but...) I have worked for over 16 years on the computer systems (radar, telemetry) which are used in tracking the missiles we fire out of Vandenberg Air Force Base here in California. Allow me to introduce you to a number which has significant relevance on many of the calculations that run on the missiles, and on those tracking computers, and therefore is used in the software running on them: 7.292115147X10-5
> 
> What is this number? It is the rotation rate of the earth in radians per second. (For the ease of those who don't know, multiply that by 180 and divide by π to get it in degrees per second, which is about 4.178074X10-3, and which in turn amounts to 360.9856 degrees per day (multiply the 4.178074X10-3 by 86400 seconds in a day).
> 
> For one thing, notice that the rate is non-zero If we use zero instead of that number and attempt to compute the course of the rocket, the range might be obligated to destroy a missile which is perfectly on course, or even worse, might fail to detect that a missile which is off course and on its way to landing on someone, so as to destroy it when necessary. Even a very small error could threaten people's lives.
> 
> For another thing, notice the remaining ".9856" degrees. It is just slightly less than one degree in excess of a complete circle. *That excess represents the motion of the earth around the sun in a single day, such that the earth must turn that amount more than a circle in order to reach the same exact time of day. *Divide the 360 degrees of a circle by the 365.2425 days in a true solar year (calendar years handle the ".2425" by inserting a "February 29" every fourth year, except three out of four century years), and that gets our ".9856" degrees.



Geocentrism versus Heliocentrism


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## JennyG

ChristianTrader said



> I think a YEC Creationist has an incredibly difficult time denying Geocentrism. Geocentrism has an even better pedigree in church history than YEC, and YEC has a good pedigree. The Reformers, had no problem properly interpreting the "God has wings" and the "flat earth" passages while firmly maintaining their geocentrism. This seems to imply that their hermeneutics was a bit more nuanced than some want to give them credit for having.
> 
> What I also find interesting is how much ambiguity passages where no ambiguity was found for the first thousand+ years of church history all of a sudden has ambiguity all over it when "Science" starts to bark. First it was geocentrism, then 6 day creationism, then homosexuality etc. etc.
> 
> I am not accusing anyone of secretly being a liberal but this 500 year progression is frightening.


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## MW

Skyler said:


> Armourbearer, how should the passage in Joshua 10 read if the heliocentric model were correct?



It should read correctly.

I haven't said the heliocentric model is not correct but have noted the two should not be placed in competition with each other. Astronomy is an ever advancing science. What appears contradictory today may be harmonised tomorrow with the unveiling of new discoveries. Any scientist worth his salt acknowledges this. To say that science must have the final word is to make an unscientific statement. Science is an open canon, therefore contradiction is to be expected. Christian scientists should be wary of reading the Bible like science or science like the Bible. We expect non contradiction in the Bible because it is a closed canon. What it says it has always said and will always say. Science is an open canon. It has said things which it no longer says and what it says today may yet be changed. The dogmatic statements made in favour of absolute heliocentricity in this thread are simply unscientific, to say the least.


----------

