[__ Science __ ] WHO IS DEAD? GOD OR DARWIN?

[Barbarian]

What was the light God created on Day 1? Daylight, obviously. The light of day. But we still don't have the sun. And here's where Johnston points out the modern assumption in our thinking: in ancient times they didn't make the connection between the sun and daylight, but apparently saw these as two separate light sources. After all, there is already daylight before the sun rises, and when the sun sets it is still light out for awhile. Apparently they never put two and two together that the sun was the source of daylight.

That makes a lot of sense. The sky is visibly luminous, after all. So it would be an obvious error, analogous to the error that the moon is a source of light, rather than a reflector.

 

[TMal3]

That makes a lot of sense. The sky is visibly luminous, after all. So it would be an obvious error, analogous to the error that the moon is a source of light, rather than a reflector.

Yes, I thought so too. Made a lot of sense when I first heard it. Nice to run into other believers who 'get it'. On other forums I'm usually accused of heresy, lol. I don't think we realize how much our own culture and modern understanding colors our reading of Scripture (myself included). I always have to be on guard of letting my own personal biases getting in the way. Even things as 'simple' as "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," and picturing planet earth floating in space when they wouldn't have had that conception and earth (Hebrew eretz) simply meant "land" (although "heavens and earth" seems to be a merism still implying totality). That's why accommodationism seems to make more sense (at least to me) than concordism with modern science. Although I don't pretend to understand how it all works out, including unsolved problems. I'm starting to ramble, so that's a sign I should stop. Blessings.

 

[Barbarian]

Even things as 'simple' as "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," and picturing planet earth floating in space when they wouldn't have had that conception and earth (Hebrew eretz) simply meant "land" (although "heavens and earth" seems to be a merism still implying totality).

The word "tevel" means something like "all lands, everywhere." But that probably isn't quite what we mean by "the world" or at least didn't start that way. By Hellenistic times (post-Alexander the Great), educated Jewish people were aware that the Earth was round and even how big it is. It's significant that none of them seem to have found any conflict between that and the descriptions of a flat Earth with a solid dome over it, that we find in early scripture. I think they too realized that such things are not the message God was giving us.

Likely, "tevel" meant something like the Koine Greek "κόσμος", as in Luke where Caesar orders a census of κόσμος "the whole world"; meaning the extent of the Roman Empire.