Noah's Ark

Ahem. I'm just being lazy, and I think I just found what I was after at the blue letter bible site - I can poke around at the Hebrew and Greek if I want to wrestle with an orininal word ('Elohiym' is a nice example, or of course 'Firmament'). But I'll take a look at the JPS for a sane read, to make sure I don't fall over my feet (covered or otherwise)

yes, the concordance feature is quite handy, especially for those who can't read hebrew.but remember, verify its definitions elsewhere. it often gives some rather biased (and sometimes wacky) opinions. look up behemoth and leviathan, for instance. also, it doesn't usually render idioms very well. you can probably look up the origins of "cover" and "feet" and not discover they're talking about peeing.

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אָרַח

Hmmm, a fire breathing pleiosaur... They didn't mention that in Sunday school. I shall write a stern letter to the Bishop forthwith.

this is my point. i picked that example because it was obviously the most illustrative of their bias. they want to make it fit some previous idea of something.i've also seen it called a crocodile.

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אָרַח

Bold Emphasis MineHello Dead Parrot Is this guy trying to say that the Bible actually refers to planet earth? Let me assure y'all that the Bible NEVER uses the word 'earth' or 'world' to indicate a planet of any kind, much less planet earth. The authors had no such concept, and the translators (Luther et. al.) did not subscribe to the idea of planet earth. In fact they ridiculed it.The above quote does afford some wiggle room for its author by virtue of the 'or' he inserts in the definition of tebel. Even so, whether we read: "whole earth," "all the earth," or "entire earth," it is NEVER about 'planet' earth.The idea that earth is a planet comes directly from the Heliocentric Theory of Copernicus; a man whom Martin Luther called, "that fool." Heliocentric Theory is a Godless Theory which is, to quote the Roman Inquisition, "... contrary to holy scripture."Dr. Robert Young (Young's Analytical Concordance) gives as the primitive meaning of tebel: Dr. James Strong (Strong's Exhaustive Concordance) give as the primitive meaning: Or, I say, a derivative of 2988 (same primitive spelling) - "yabal ... a stream;" In other words, tebel literally means: Irrigated Land. Exactly what you'd expect of "habitable earth." This word (tebel) cannot mean: 'entire earth,' in the sense that moderns understand that expression.At 1 Chronicles 16:30 it is proclaimed that "the world (tebel) also shall be stable, that it be not moved." This is one of the verses cited at Galileo's trial to 'prove' that 'earth' does not rotate.At Job 18:18, the wicked man is "chased out of the world (tebel)." Does this mean he is driven off the planet?Tebel cannot mean 'entire earth' in the sense we take that expression today.BTW - In the KJV at least, Tebel is never translated 'earth.'This message has been edited by doctrbill, 05-15-2005 08:57 AM

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

Thanks Doc.It's a recurring problem I'm having, since I know bugger all about Hebrew (or Greek, for that matter) and the etymology sorces unsurprisingly tend to be in Christian bible study sites & books. Thier objectivity may be less than perfect, and working out which bits have been glossed over is a slightly hit-and-miss affair (I missed with tebel for example).Ho hum. I've found a similar problem with the history of the Bible, where the Pentateuch J & P sources just sort of pop into existance: I'm currently banging my head against The Cambridge history of the Bible, a book of Mesopotamian mythology and Frazer's Mythology in the the old Testament in the hope of gaining some insight. At about 2,500 pages between them, it might take a while... No, but "the world" gives the same impression, at least to a 20th century mind. I have subsequently found a bit of a give-away in Proverbs 8:31:

quote:

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Rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth; and my delights were with the sons of men.

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Where Erets is translated as 'earth' and Tebel is just the 'habitable part'. Given the author of that article has just demonstrated that Erets would be better translated as 'land', he's possibly being a bit, err, over-enthusiastic. "Laughing in the irrigated part of the land" might be more accurate, but it makes the author sound like a lunatic in a ditch.I don't want to know about "My delights were with the sons of men". That's just nasty. Well, in some of the Wyatt's Ark stuff there are some remarkable claims for ancient technology... Maybe they did have a space program... Oh well. For my next trick, I'll proove the Garden of Eden was actually a window box. Many thanks to you and Arach for helping me out on this - I'm sure I'll get the hang of it eventually.

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Mat 27:5 And he went and hanged himself
Luk 10:37 Go, and do thou likewise.

Even the 'experts' on which I rely are sometimes less reliable than one might hope. Strong, for instance, in his etymology of 'tebel,' adds "by extension the globe." He does not attempt to support this assertion but he does (honestly) provide the evidence to contradict it. Strange business this ...When it comes to whether or not the Bible reveals the planetary nature of 'earth,' let me assure you that it does not. That fact was made abundently clear by religious authorities beginning with the defamation of Copernicus and continuing through the persecution, excommunication, execution and general harrassment of scientific geniuses of the sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. The religious establishment does not explain why it changed its mind; never explained how Copernican doctrine could be "contrary to holy scripture" yesterday and in harmony with it today.Religionists have had a couple of hundred years to set up smoke and mirrors, insert unsubstantiated assertions into their reference books, redefine ancient Hebrew to accomodate NASA technology; and all this in the hope that no one remembers how they were willing to damn all who believed that heresy which they now attempt to support from the same book they used to condemn those heretics to hell.Yeah. It's been nearly 500 years and I'm still pissed. Bleepin' Lying, Bleepin' Charlatans. One hand in your pocket and the other on the Bible and their tongue in your ear. There oughta be a law!

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

I'll be sure to try it soon. (LOL!) But first, is this an obvious implication that in order to understand the Bible more fully, you must go to the hebrew source? Besides, there is a strict biblical penalty for expounding on things to twist them into sophistry. So it's not always beneficial to translate the Bible to make it fit your ways.My father is first elder in my church, and he got in trouble once for
trying to translate the Bible to become adverse to the church.

I think you hit a wrong button.

I'm very sorry, preacher, sir. I meant to reply to another person here, but I guess the reply buttin I chose was the incorrect one. Sorry.Specter

Exactly. Indeed, it would be nice to see the original cuneiform, if we could find it...With regards to the flood, the English translation suggests it was global, but that is based on the beliefs of the translators as much as the script. The wording of the original matches a more local geography, but they didn't have the language (or even the concept) to describe a planetary event.In this case, neither the advocates of a global flood or a local one can claim some scriptural advantage over the other, because the text is necessarily ambiguous. That they both do so tells us more about them than it does the Bible...It's unlikely the authors were being deliberately vague when they wrote it. All we can do is try to work out what they trying to say, regardless of how it fits in to our personal understanding or beliefs. (And that goes for your father, too. )Sadly, this seems to be way down the priority list for most people.

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Mat 27:5 And he went and hanged himself
Luk 10:37 Go, and do thou likewise.

Many years ago while working as a volunteer fireman, we got a call. "Come quick", the voice said, "The whole world's on fire". Then there was a click and the line went dead.From the front of the building we could see a column of smoke rising over the tree line. We sent one of the guys up into the hose tower (a 100 foot tall structure where we hung hoses to dry) to see if he could get a better location. When he came down he said it appeared to be out past B&A Boulevard so we sent a 4-wheel drive attack truck headed off in that direction and put the tanker, pumpers, ambulance and main equipemnt on ready status.About fifteen minutes later we got a radio transmission from Field Truck #2 saying, "Come quick. The whole world's on fire".End of transmission.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Yeah, the simple fact we managed to sent probes beyond Pluto before the Vatican admitted they might have been wrong about Galileo & Copernicus speaks volumes...

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Mat 27:5 And he went and hanged himself
Luk 10:37 Go, and do thou likewise.

LOL. OK, I'm going to think about this before demanding an explaination...Edit for brain fart.This message has been edited by Dead Parrot, 05-17-2005 10:44 AM

Arrrgh! Jar, and what is the rest of the story?That is what was on fire?lfen