The "Circle of the Earth"

No it doesn't. The word "circuit" implies a path - i.e. movement - and not necessarily a circular path. Isaiah does not suggest that God is moving at all. On the contrary, the word "sitteth" suggests strongly that He is stationary. is irrelevant. We're talking about Isaiah. That's exactly what I've been saying. The topic is about the shape of the object. Even if God did circle around the earth in a Radio Flyer or on a toboggan, it would be irrelevant to this discussion. If you think Isaiah says nothing about the shape of the earth, you're done. You've conceded.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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But you're not comparing scripture with scripture. You're taking a hare-brained interpretaion of Ezekiel and a hare-brained interpretaion of Job and projecting them onto Isaiah, where they have no relevance.And you're still missing the fact that this is a science thread. Comparing scripture with scripture has no place here.The question still is: Did the author(s) of Isaiah know the earth is spheroidal? God "orbiting" or hovering doesn't answer that question.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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Metaphors, by definition, are made up. How can we possibly understand the metaphors of the Bible better than we can understand the plain text?If we see the phrase, "Cats like cream," we can take it literally or we can conclude that it means, "Musicians like to date rich girls."Why would we assume it is a metaphor? And how do we know that our metaphoric interpretation is the same as the author's?

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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In this case, of course, the poetic language does refer back to what is known about Hebrew cosmology - a flat, domed earth. Hence, the tent imagery. (I would suggest that it's more of an analogy than a metaphor.) Unfortunately, in their rush to prove that God told all His secrets to the Hebrews, literalists tend to miss the literary merits of the Bible.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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The autographs are irrelevant. We can understand what we do have either literally or non-literally. If our understanding isn't exactly what the authors intended, so what?The question of this thread is: Can we conclude from Isaiah 40:22 that the authors knew the earth is a sphere? The best answer (in my opinion) is: No, we can not. The "circle of the earth" is what God would see from His vantage point. Either a flat disk or the "top view" of a sphere would appear circular.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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Exactly.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
-------------
Help scientific research in your spare time. No cost. No obligation.
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Your "point at hand" has been dealt with repeatedly in this thread - and by non-atheists as well. You agreed yourself that there isn't enough evidence to conclude exactly what (the authors of) Isaiah knew about the shape of the earth.In the face of less-than-complete evidence, the sensible course is to accept the ordinary explanation, not an extraordinary one. In this case, the ordinary explanation is that the authors likely believed what their contemporaries believed - that the earth was a flat disk.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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Accepting that we don't know 100% what the authors of Isaiah thought contributes nothing to the topic. The topic is about what they probably thought, based on their writings and the writings of their contemporaries.The best conclusion we can derive is that they probably believed the world was flat. Don't confuse yourself by requiring a 100% solution.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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That's what people have been trying to tell you: the best theory (explanation).

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place”
-- Joseph Goebbels
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