The Bible's Flat Earth

Fair enough, but it's just an idea - so let's take a look at what you're saying:

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"God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry [land] appear: ... God called the dry [land] Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas:" Genesis 1:9,10

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Strangely enough, I don't see this as conflicting with my idea! In this quote, God is specifically naming the Seas and the Earth - ergo they should be capitalized (the word "seas" wouldn't otherwise be capitalized also).I don't think there's a problem with lumping the seas and the earth as "part of the creation where man can exist" (I don't have a single word for it) because "the waters above" and "the waters below" seem to be predominantly god's domain and were apparently there before he created "earth" for us (beginning of Genesis 1 when god walked upon the face of the deep).I think they're described as seperate entities (earth and water) because, well, they are!I think that they're also very distinct from "the waters above" and "the waters below", those two being two seperate realms from where the earth AND the seas are, and of course heaven (and hell).

Are you the same person who argued that the "earth" of Genesis 1:1 is NOT planet earth? You "think"? How about you read, and limit your conclusions to the evidence of Scripture?I think you're not reading carefully enough.

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Gen 1:6 ... Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters ...

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Gen 1:7 ... God made the firmament, and divided the waters ...

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Gen 1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven...

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Gen 1:9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry [land] appear: ....

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Gen 1:10 And God called the dry [land] Earth;and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: ...

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So "Earth" appeared in the water under the heaven; the water which had been "gathered together into one place."If "earth" did not "appear" in "the waters under the heaven" then where did "earth" appear? "Apparently"?!Where is this apparent?It is NOT apparent in the text of the Holy Bible. You may have heard it said. You may have imagined it to be so. But you DID NOT read it from the Bible. The Bible clearly states that the separation of the water was a direct result of placing a firmament "in the midst of" the water.If you have evidence to the contrary, then,Please present it.

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Theology is the science of Dominion.
- - - My God is your god's Boss - - -

yes?"Earth" as the name of a planet is "Earth" - capitalized."earth" as "land" is just...land."Earth" as a domain created by god is a Naming - ergo needs capitalization, the same that "seas" normally wouldn't be capitalized, but when Named as a domain, needs it. You can see this when the angel sets one foot in the sea and one on the earth...neither are capitalized, right? But when God Names them, they are?Do you disagree with my idea? you don't?

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Gen 1:6 ... Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters ...
Gen 1:7 ... God made the firmament, and divided the waters (1)...
Gen 1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven.(2)..
Gen 1:9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven(2) be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry [land] appear: ....
Gen 1:10 And God called the dry [land] Earth;and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: ...

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(1) the waters were divided by the firmament - God created the firmament, but the waters were already there - no? I certainly see God creating the heaven and the earth, but there's no mention of him creating the waters too.(2) here is an example of what I'm talking about - when God "Named" "Heaven", it is capitalized. When it is described later on, it is not. this is still consistent with my idea and you have shown me nothing which is not.I'm not a biblical scholar, but my idea appears to hold water, yes? Well, I see god creating the heaven and the earth and dividing the waters (the firmament became heaven) - but I don't explicitly see god creating the waters!Can you show me where he does?

I like it. To me it does read as god naming the dry land Earth... but it still isn't referring to the whole planet. It think that he thought that you were saying that "above" and "below" were already divided before the creation, which would be wrong.But you are right that the waters were already there.

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1In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

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2And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

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I think I read something here before about some Jewish folklore with the whole face of the deep and waters thing being the null, or default, state of all exstence.... or something like that.

Precisely! He's Naming a domain when it is capitalized - Earth, Sea, Heaven, etc - none of which refer to outer space or planet Earth as such, and only appears so to people who already have the notion and would like it to apply to validate their own world views. Many religions have a "formless" default state of creation, it is often identified with "water", probably because water doesn't shape itself, and it's not obvious that the sky isn't water (why does it rain if the sky isn't made of water?) and it's not obvious the Earth is a planet and not flat...of course, to people who presuppose ancient knowledge far in advance of our own, despite all evidence to the contrary (I don't see Adam going to school, neither did he have a cellphone - this doesn't negate God knowing everything), presuppositions trump everything.

Isn't water also thought of as some kind of essence of all things, or something like that.I'd have to do some searching but I'm kinda busy at work now.

I think you make a good argument, but it doesn't seem to "hold water." Problem is, there appears to be no consistency in the matter; neither within the KJV itself, nor among its predecessors and competitors. For example, the first English language Bible to appear in print, the Coverdale Bible (1535), at Genesis 1:1 reads:

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In ye begynnynge God created heauen & earth:

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and at Genesis 1:10 reads:

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And God called ye drye londe, Earth: and the gatheringe together of waters called he, ye See. And God sawe yt it was good.

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The Geneva Bible (1560) and the Douay Bible (1609) also follow this pattern.This challenges your theory about capitalization being related to awareness of "earth" being a planet. Observe verses 11 and 12 in the 1611 KJV:

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Gen 1:11 And God said, Let the Earth bring foorth grasse, ...

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Gen 1:12 And the earth brought foorth grasse, ....

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What will you do with that, I wonder.And compare that with the 1769 edition:

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11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, ....

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12 And the earth brought forth grass ...

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And what of "earth" in the follwoing instance?

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Gen 1:14 And God said, Let there bee lights in the firmament of the heauen,...

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Gen 1:15 ... lights in the firmament of the heauen, to giue light vpon the earth: ...

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Gen 1:16 And God made two great lights: ...

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Gen 1:17 And God set them in the firmament of the heauen, to giue light vpon the earth:

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In these verses, "earth" is NOT capitalized in either edition of the KJV. Should we then conclude that it is NOT intended in a global sense?I don't think so.If the translators intended to comment on either the global or planetary issues raised around the word "earth" there is certainly no evidence to support it; at least not any which makes itself apparent in the creation narrative as it exists in the numerous version I have surveyed prior to my assertions in this regard.A bit of trivia: The New International Version and the New Living Translation have eliminated the word "earth" from verse 10. And THE MESSAGE has capitalized every instance of the word "earth" throughout this chapter. No can do. It is a fact that ancient "science" held water to be the primeval element from which all others (earth, wind, and fire) were created. The Bible does not propose to tell us where the water came from.

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Theology is the science of Dominion.
- - - My God is your god's Boss - - -

I'm pretty sure he's NOT saying that the capitalization is related to awareness of "earth" being a planet. He's saying they're using it in a proper noun form as the name of the dry land (which they don't think is a planet).Like:Let the dry earth be named Earth...Edited by Catholic Scientist, : No reason given.

aahhh you noticed the pun but seriously... This follows what I said - the first two talk about them as a place - i.e. heauen(sic) and earth, the second is when he is naming them - i.e. Earth and See(sic). The first example is use as a noun, the second as a proper noun.I appologize if I wasn't being clear enough - it's not about "awareness" of the Earth as a planet or not as such, but the usage that *first* dictated capitalization, not the status. I hope that doesn't sound like a retro-fit because it's not.My opinion (and it really is just opinion) is that "earth" as "dry land" was usage as a common noun, and Earth was usage as a proper noun, but it didn't mean the planet.I think it possible and likely that the "domain" may have changed over time, and especially likely to have been changed after Galileo's ideas were no longer considered heretical.When God orders the Earth (domain) to bring forth seed, earth (the land) does so because they wouldn't be much use growing in the sea - however you noted that the capitalization disappears in the 1769 edition; this would be after Galileo's ideas were considered potable, because (IMHO) they were sure it didn't mean Earth the planet, so to avoid confusion changed it.Do we have records of why and how it changed? We know roughly when (to within 150 years or so) from your fine detective work - all I've got is my suspicions!My suspicions seem to be leading somewhere - at least there's no talk of the Earth as a sphere, many times as a circle or plane and many times as having corners, as having the sky draped above it like a tent, and so on.Naming the domain doesn't mean they knew it was a planet (they quite obviously didn't as otherwise Galileo would never have been in trouble!) and doesn't ignore the deep/waters above the sky/heaven and below the ground which the bible is quite clear are there.It's the earth (dry land) that needs the lights of heaven, not Earth the domain - I don't see any problem there with them deciding to talk about the land as land, and I don't see it contradicting.I'd also have great problems trying to reconcile new translations made in light of not only new knowledge, but new socio-policitical drives to appear, for example, more correct than older "inferior" versions.It's one of the reason that so many people poo-poo the NIV as "the comic book bible" and flat out trash many others as hopeless misguided, and stick to the KJV as being the best - it was made with older manuscripts than the Catholics and came from scholarly language not the vulgar language of the unwashed masses.

Huh?Growing up Catholic, we always used the KJV.

O RLY?learn something new every day! I thought the official Catholic bible was the vulgate from...google tells me "Saint Jerome" and that the KJV was ordered by it's namesake, King James V who was protestant.Catholics hate protestant version, protestants hate the catholic version, they both hate the comic book new international version, etc, etc.Can't be a Real True Catholic(tm) then

In this particular instance you were commenting on Coverdale's Genesis. I showed you Coverdale's version because he did not capitalize "heaven and earth." {He also did not include the articles, because he relied on the Vulgate (which does not contain the articles).If I understand your theory properly, then the fact that the other early Protestant English Bibles: Geneva and Bishops, which DO feature the articles but DO NOT capitalilze "the heaven" and "the earth." So, I am wondering; Why did they NOT capitalize these words and why, all those years later, did the KJV choose to capitalize them, and then later decide to join the crowd which does NOT capitalize the words? (virtually no one else has capitalized them since; the MSG excepted).As for verse 10, almost everyone has capitalized "Earth" in that place. Those who do NOT capitalize "earth" at verse 10 include: Wycliffe (1396), Bishops (1568), French LSV (1901), God's Word (1995), and the NASB (1995).If all this is about the rules of English, then several somebodies must be disseminating bad translations!?!Given that the classics did not feature such refinements as capitalization, punctuation, and spaces between words, the issue goes to: What, if anything intelligible, does the Bible say?Yes?

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Theology is the science of Dominion.
- - - My God is your god's Boss - - -

never heard of it...I dunno what the "official" one is, but in my 12 years of Catholic school we used the KJV.

You seem to be confused. The situation is "Earth" the dry land. Gen 1:10.So which is it, do you think? Is it "earth" when it's dry land and "Earth" when it is domain? Or is it the other way 'round?And, why would you assume that sailors at sea don't need the lights?This round has done little to improve my understanding of your thought.db

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Theology is the science of Dominion.
- - - My God is your god's Boss - - -

I think you've hit the problem on the head - the rules of "English".In about two thousand years, "English" has changed more than three times from Old, to Middle to Modern English and the styles and rules have changed and been codified all along that time.The only timeframe I can talk about is with Modern English, and it would have to cover times after which the syntax and grammar of English was set firm, and THEN we should be comparing usage in bibles printed/copied before about 1900 but after about 1500.I freely admit I don't have the skill - nor more importantly the time - to make a thorough investigation. All I have is a pet hypothesis.The reason I don't believe it's totally invalid is due to the claim by people even more ignorant than me that "Earth" meant the planet, and they believe this because they demand that the bible be the first and foremost bastion of truth and can't ever be wrong.You've just displayed that I may have something - remarkable inconsistency in earlier versions, many of which didn't have spaces between words, punctuation, capital letters nor other niceties.Given that, somebody has been changing the text (many somebodies) waaaaay after it was written, and now people are claiming that the new capitalization meant the original writers had knowledge that it is otherwise clear they didn't, I think it's one way to point out those people are dead wrong.I still think that Earth as a proper noun only means a planet if you know that "The Earth" is a planet - and that use of "Heaven" and "See/Seas" as proper nouns tells us they were talking about something I'm calling a "domain" - if the writers knew (and the capitalization reflected this knowledge) that the Earth was a planet, then "seas" would never be a proper noun, right?