THE BIBLE
SAYS THAT THERE IS WATER OUTSIDE OUR CIRCUMSCRIBED UNIVERSE:
F. C.
(Last Review, 2 February
2004)
Can you imagine our own
Universe as a gigantic cell in suspension? Let’s see what can we perceive of the
wonderful and trustworthy book of the Bible.
THE WATERS
ABOVE THE HEAVENS:
Gen 1:6-7,
"And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the
waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the
firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the
waters which were above the firmament: and it was
so.”
John Gill says, "And God
made the firmament... By a word speaking, commanding it into being, producing it
out of the chaos, and spreading it in that vast space between the heaven of
heavens and our earth... Mr. Gregory (in his
Notes and Observations, &c. c. 23. p. 110, &c.) is of opinion, that an abyss of waters above the most
supreme orb is here meant; or a great deep
between the heavens and the heaven of heavens, where, as in storehouses, the
depth is laid up; and God has his treasures of snow, hail, and rain, and
from whence he brought out the waters which drowned
the world at the universal deluge.”
Keli and Delitzsch state:
"The division of the chaotic mass of waters through
the formation of the firmament, which was placed as a wall of separation in the
midst of the waters, and divided them into upper and lower waters… Keerl, [makes] the bold
assertion, that the mass of water which came through the windows of heaven at
the flood was different from the rain which falls from the clouds, beyond the
limits of the terrestrial atmosphere”.
Albert Barnes says,
regarding the word "made” in Gen 1:7: "work
on,” "make out of already existing
materials.”
"Praise him, ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that
be above the heavens… He hath also stablished them for ever and
ever…” (Ps. 148:4, 6a).
Arthur Clarke explains this
verse as "Heavens exceeding heavens (heavens of
heavens—the very highest). Systems of systems extending as far beyond the solar
system, as it does beyond the lowest deeps… This refers to Gen 1:7, Clouds (Nebulae), vapours, air, exhalations,
rain, snow, and meteors (Comets)
of every kind.”
In "The Treasury of David,”
written by C. H. Spurgeon, we read regarding that Biblical scripture, "Let the sea above roar, and the fullness thereof, at the
presence of Jehovah, the God of Israel”: "There is something of mystery about these supposed
reservoirs of water; but let them be what they may, and as they may, they shall
give glory to the Lord our God. Let the most unknown and perplexing phenomena
take up their parts in the universal praise”.
Keli and Delitzsch comment
on this verse, "this notion may also have things for
its substance which lie beyond our knowledge of nature. The Scriptures, from the
first page to the last, acknowledge the existence of celestial waters, to which
the rain-waters stand in the relation as it were of a finger-post pointing
upwards (see Gen. 1:7).... for ever and ever (Psa. 111:8), i.e., in order for
ever to maintain the position in the whole of creation which He has assigned to
them.”
God tells us that the
heavenly bodies, including this huge heavenly body of waters that surrounds the
universe, are "established for ever and
ever”.
John Gill also expresses
that: "The Targum is, "ye waters, that by the Word (of the Lord) hang above the
heavens'', in which is displayed the glory of
amazing power, wisdom, and goodness. The most ancient Syrians and Arabians were
thoroughly persuaded, that beyond the bounds of the visible heavens there was a
great sea, without any limits; which some (Vid. Steeb. Coelum
Sephirot. Heb. c. 7. s. 3. p. 126, 127. and Gregory's already mentioned
Works…, p. 110) suppose to be the waters here
meant”.
Albert Barnes adds: "The allusion here is to the waters which seem to be above…
which seem to come from some higher region - some higher heaven”.
And the NET Bible
says: "The "water” mentioned here corresponds to
the "waters above” mentioned in Gen 1:7 ” (See also Ps 104:3). For a
discussion of the picture envisioned by the psalmist, see L. I. J. Stadelmann,
The Hebrew Conception of the World, 47”.
"Who
layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters…” (Pss
104:3a).
Of this verse Albert Barnes
says, "the exalted abode of God - as if raised above
all other edifices, or above the world. The word "waters” here refers to the
description of the creation in Gen. 1:6-7 - the waters "above the firmament”…
the meaning is, that God had constructed the place of his own abode - the room
where he dwelt - in those waters; that is, in the most exalted place in the
universe. It does not mean that he made it of the waters, but that his home -
his dwelling-place - was in or above those waters, as if he had built his
dwelling not on solid earth or rock, but in the waters, giving stability to that
which seems to have no stability, and making the very waters a foundation for
the structure of his abode.”
And again in "The Treasury
of David” we read, "His lofty halls are framed with
the waters which are above the firmament. The upper rooms of God's great house,
the secret stories far above our ken, the palatial chambers wherein he resides,
are based upon the floods which form the upper ocean. To the unsubstantial he
lends stability; he needs no joists and rafters, for his palace is sustained by
his own power.”
"Hast thou with Him spread out the sky?” (Job
37:18).
THE
DEPTHS:
Some usages of the Hebrew
word Tehowm, translated as "deep” or "depth” in
English:
"The waters are hid as a stone, and the face of the deep
is frozen” (Job 38:30).
"Thy righteousness is like the great mountains; thy
judgments are a great deep: O LORD, thou preservest man and
beast” (Ps. 36:6).
"Thou coveredst it with the deep as with a
garment: the waters stood above the mountains” (Ps.
104:6).
"The mountains saw thee, and they trembled: the
overflowing of the water passed by: the deep uttered his voice,
and lifted up his hands on high” (Hab. 3:10) ["lifted up his hands
on high” is a figure for the overflowing of waters coming from the
deep].
"Whatsoever the LORD pleased, that did he in heaven,
and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places” (Ps.
135:6).
"Praise the LORD from the earth, ye dragons, and all
deeps” (Ps. 148:7).
"Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? or hast
thou walked in the search of the depth?” (Job
38:16).
"By his knowledge the depths are broken up, and the
clouds (skies) drop down the dew” (Prov. 3:20) ["the dew” is the night
mist, which falls only when there are no clouds, The NET
Bible].
The waters of the flood did
came from one "deep”, the "deep” of the outer space to flood the
earth, but God formed another "deep” under our earth to dry the earth
again, after the flood:
"He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap: he
layeth up the depth in storehouses” (Ps. 33:7) ["he layeth up the
depth in storehouses”, as the water is stored
frozen].
"Even by the God of
thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with
blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth
under…” (Gen. 49:25a).
"And of Joseph he said, Blessed of the LORD be his
land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep
that coucheth beneath” (Deut. 33:13).
"He clave the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them
drink as out of the great depths” (Ps.
78:15).
"They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the
depths…” (Ps. 107:26).
THE DOORS AND
THE WINDOWS OF THE HEAVENS:
"Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it brake
forth, as if it had issued out of the womb? When I made the cloud the
garment thereof, and thick darkness a swaddlingband for it, And brake up for it
my decreed place, and set bars and doors, And said, Hitherto shalt thou
come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed?” (Job
38:8-11)
That which is revealed in
Genesis 1:6 and 7:11-12 is here clearly implied. In the thirtieth verse of the
same chapter of Job 38 we meet with the expression "the face of the deep” which is found in Genesis
1:2, and nowhere else, except in the similar context of Proverbs 8:27,
"When He prepared the heavens, I (wisdom
personified) was there, when He drew a circle on the face of the
world”
Which in a peculiar manner
is a retrospective about the book of Job, in which Elihu knew that a "firmament” had been "stretched out” as indicated in Genesis 1:6-8, using
the very verb raka which gives us the word translated "firmament” and which is translated in the margin of
the AV "expansion” and in the
RV margin "expanse”.
It will be remembered that Genesis 1:2 reveals a
prehistoric catastrophe:
"The earth became without form (tohu) and void (bohu): and darkness was upon the face of the deep
(tehowm)”.
This revelation is somehow
present in the book of Job, where we read:
"He stretcheth out the north over the empty place
(tohu), and hangeth the earth upon
nothing” (Job 26:7)
and
"Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? or hast
thou walked in the search of the depth (tehowm)?” (Job 38:16).
Does the Bible
describe ozone holes?
Science has defined some of
the Biblical windows of heaven as "ozone holes,” and imagined them as being
man-made (use of CFC’s and other gaseous compounds, (ref. 10);
however, if we adhere to what the Bible has to say about them, we can see that
those very holes have been there since the beginning, as "a chimney with its apertures for smoke,” to let out
all atmospheric contaminants (to expel gaseous toxics to the outer, empty
space), as the ozone holes can be closed or opened intermittently.
At the time of the flood
(the waters coming from the outer space found a barrier on our atmosphere and
formed a "mono-layer” outside and around it, which some Bible Scholars called
"the canopy”); then, when the ozone holes where opened (Heb. pathach),
the waters entered like a thick and huge cascade over the poles.
These "ozone holes” were the
first place of entrance for that water that came from outer space, from the
farthest limits of our universe. So, that water entered like a thick waterfall
in liquid state at 0 °C and entered through that "ozone holes”. Then, as the
water arrived to the earth surface at the poles, it became frozen immediately,
freezing instantly plants and animals, forming the thick permafrost (that’s why
we found mammals (like thousands of Mammoths) and plants (like palm trees)
frozen in the north pole "out of a sudden”, as before the flood the weather over
all the earth was uniform, the four seasons came to be as a consequence of the
flood and of the redistribution of waters, winds and heat on our atmosphere). As
more and more water continued entering, it overflowed the poles and inundated
the whole earth, covering all the mountains in existence at that time. The
evaporation and precipitation of that exceeding waters lasted forty days [That
even may have included a hole made on the earth’s surface of the poles as a
consequence of the strong penetration of such waters from the outer space with
its posterior emergence as "geysers”].
"The fountains also of the deep (Heb. tehowm,
Gk. abussou) and the windows (Heb.
‘arubbah, Gk. kataractai) of heaven
were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained” (Gen.
8:2).
It is
interesting the plural use of "windows” of heaven, which may include not only
the ozone holes, but also the holes of the final limits of our universe, in the
outer space, which as we have seen, according to the Bible is surrounded by
water. The "doors” or holes on the final (or last) limits of our universe may be
something very similar to the theoretical black holes of Albert Einstein.
"Windows” also include the "lattices” of the clouds from which the rain most
commonly falls.
In the Bible it is
written that,
"the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all
the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered. Fifteen
cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered”
(Gen. 7:19-20).
In Psalm 104:6 we
have another statement related to that event,
"thou coveredst it with the deep as with a garment:
the waters stood above the mountains”.
After the flood, and by the
order of God, there was an increasing volcanic activity that led to the
formation of the high mountainous chains and high peaks, like the Everest,
leaving marine sediments on the top of them. Being almost all of those
mountainous complexes lined parallel to the ocean bays in order to allow the
waters of the flood to drain out of the earth.
After that flood,
the order given to the waters and the increase in the height of the mountains is
described as,
"At thy rebuke they (the waters of the
flood) fled; at the voice of thy thunder they
hasted away” (Ps. 104:7),
"The mountains
rose, the valleys sank down to the place which thou didst appoint for
them” (Ps.
104:8, RSV),
"Thou hast set a bound that they (the waters of
the flood) may not pass over; that they turn not
again to cover the earth” (Ps. 104:9).
Let’s review the words used
in the Old Testament to describe the earlier events of the
flood:
"In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second
month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of
the great (Heb. rabaah, Gk. word lost in the Septuagint
translation) deep (Heb. tehowm, Gk.
abussou) broken up, and the windows
(Heb. ‘arubbah, Gk. kataractai) of
heaven were opened (Heb. pathach, Gk. eneojtesan). And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty
nights” (Gen. 7:11-12)
"The fountains also of the deep and the windows
(Heb. ‘arubbah, Gk. kataractai) of
heaven were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained” (Gen.
8:2).
As we have seen before,
Tehowm is an abyss, as a surging mass of water; while " ‘Arubbah”
is "a chimney with its apertures for smoke, a dove-cot (dove’cote’)
because of the pigeon holes, a sluice gate with specific openings for the water
to enter, that is a lattice” (ref. 9). ‘Arubbah has been
translated as "chimney” in Hosea 13:3:
"Therefore they shall be as the morning cloud, and as the
early dew that passeth away, as the chaff that is driven with the
whirlwind out of the floor, and as the smoke out of the chimney
(‘Arubbah)”
As far as I understand,
before the flood there was never been a rain, but only a mist was wetting the
surface of the ground, as water vapor:
Gen. 2:5: And every plant of the field before it was in the earth,
and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused
it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the
ground.
Gen. 2:6. But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the
whole face of the ground.
THE COMPLETE
VICTORY OF THE ONE OF US THAT WAS PERFECT:
"…Who shall descend into the deep
(abusson)? that is, to bring up Christ again
from the dead” (Rom. 10:7:),
It is remarkable that the
reference in Rom. 10:7 to the deep (abusson) is a translation of Deut.
30:13, where it says,
"Neither is it beyond the sea (Heb.
yam, Gk. talasses), that thou
shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea (Heb. yam, Gk.
talasses) for us, and bring it unto us, that
we may hear it, and do it?”
In Hebrew "yam” comes
from a root that means "to roar,” like a sea (as breaking in noisy surf) or a
large body of water.
The Peshitta translation of
Rom. 10:7 is, according to some translators, as follows: "Or, Who
descendeth to the abyss of the grave, and bringeth up Messiah from the place of
the dead?”
(Murdock), "And who has descended into the abyss of
Sheol and brought up Christ from the dead?” (Lamsa). According to that
context, abusson refers here to the profoundness of the
Sheol.
"…by the Spirit: By which also he (Christ Jesus)
went and preached unto the spirits in prison
(phulake); Which sometime were
disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah,
while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by
water. The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us… by
the resurrection of Jesus Christ…” (1 Pet.
3:18b-21a).
Jesus Christ went to
proclaim his victory to the spirits in prison, the ones left outside our
universe, where waters surround it. The angels of God, shut the doors, leaving
those spirits "in prison”. Jesus Christ presented himself to them as the
triumphant Lord of Lords. Those spirits in prison are angels that brought the
flood with the purpose of destroying the human race and to prevent that the Word
of God should be fulfilled in Christ Jesus.
Is remarkable the use of the
word "baptism” in the context of the
cleansing waters of the flood, but also of that travel of the resurrected Christ
Jesus to the outer space, in which there is water, also. We went there in Him!
We are the fruits of the resurrection of Christ!, as he was our first-fruits. We
are saved and a living evidence of the total failure of all of the attempts of
the adversary to make the Word of God of no effect by destroying and/or by
contaminating the human race.
By the specific use of
different words, Peter tells to us that those "spirits in prison” are only one
group of rebel angels, and that those are different to the other group of rebel
angels, which were called "the angels that sinned”, the ones responsible for the
origin of the Neanderthal, which are clearly depicted in the Bible…
2 Peter 2:4 For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast
them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved
unto judgment; and spared not the old world, but saved Noah...
Jude 6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left
their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto
the judgment of the great day.
Gen 6:1: And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the
face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
Gen 6:2: That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they
were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
Gen 6:4: There were giants in the earth in those days; and also
after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they
bare children to them, the same became mighty men which
were of old, men of renown.
Gen 6:5: And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in
the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart
was only evil continually.
1Chr 20:4: And it came to
pass after this, that there arose war at Gezer with the Philistines; at which
time Sibbechai the Hushathite slew Sippai,
that was of the children of the giant:
and they were subdued.
1Chr 20:5: And there was war again with the
Philistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi
the brother of Goliath the Gittite,
whose spear staff was like a weaver's beam.
1Chr 20:6: And yet again
there was war at Gath, where was a man of
great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six
on each hand , and six on each foot : and he also was the son of
the giant.
1Chr 20:7: But when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of
Shimea David's brother slew him.
1Chr 20:8: These were born unto the giant in Gath; and they fell by
the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.
Those beings tried to
corrupt the human genetics to prevent the coming of Jesus Christ but also they
failed in their purposes. But that corresponds to another chapter in our
Biblical study.
If we are able to perceive
all of these wonders, with the Bible as our secure foundation for every human
activity, for every scientific discovery, why we don’t seek and believe in our
eternal salvation according to the Bible: Receive Christ Jesus as your Lord and
Believe that God Raised Him from the Dead (as you can read in Romans 10:9-10),
and then, to manifest the gift of holy spirit in all its fullness without any
fear or doubt (1 Corinthians, Chapters 12, 13 and 14).
-----------------------------------------
APPENDIXES:
THE
ASTRONOMICAL PHYSIOGRAPHY FOUND IN THE ISBE (Edited by James Orr):
The ISBE (International
Standard Bible Encyclopedia) presents the next quotation under the word
"Astronomy”, within its subsection III. "Physiography”:
"1. THE CIRCLE OF
THE EARTH. It has
generally been assumed that the Hebrews considered the earth to be a vast
circular plain, arched over by a solid vault - "the firmament" - above which
were stored, as if in cisterns, the "treasuries" (Job 38:22) of the rain, snow
and hail, and some writers have even attempted to express this supposed
conception in diagrammatic form. One of the best of these attempts is given by
Schiaparelli, in his Astronomy in the Old Testament. The
same word used in the Old Testament to express the roundness of the heavens (Job
22:14) is also used when the circle of the earth is spoken of (Isa. 40:22), and
it is likewise applied to the deep (Prov. 8:27). Now it is obvious that the
heavens are spherical in appearance, and to an attentive observer it is clear
that the surface of the sea is also rounded.”
"(1).
The Earth a Sphere. The
spherical form of the heavens almost involves a similar form for the
earth, and their
apparent diurnal rotation certainly means that they are not rigidly connected
with the earth, but surround it on all sides at some distance from it. The earth
therefore must be freely suspended in space, and so the Book of Job describes
it: "He stretcheth out the north over empty space, and hangeth the earth upon
nothing" (Job 26:7).”
"(2). The
North Stretched out over Empty Space. Here the
"north” signifies the northern circumpolar constellations and the writer
recognized that they stretch out beyond the utmost confines of the earth; so
that he was not under any impression that the heavens rested upon the earth, or
were borne up by mountains. The celestial sphere surrounded the earth entirely,
but at a distance from it; between the two there was "empty space.” Some
commentators have indeed claimed that Job 26:10, hath described a boundary upon
the face of the waters, unto the confines of light and darkness”.
"3. THE
FIRMAMENT. (1) The
Hebrew Conception.
Above the,
spherical earth was stretched out the "firmament” made on the second day of
creation to
"divide the waters from the waters” (Gen.
1:6). To the Hebrews the "firmament” was the apparent
void above”, (2). And such, "firmament” "should be
rendered "expanse” or "space”; it corresponds to the "empty space” of Job
26:7. The "expanse” was appointed to divide "the waters which were under the expanse, from the waters
which were above the expanse”; and it has
been argued from this that the upper waters must have been regarded as being
enclosed in a watertight reservoir, furnished with sluices or floodgates, which
could be opened”
The references provided by
the ISBE for this section are:
Maunder, Astronomy of the Bible; Astronomy without a Telescope;
Schiaparelli, Astronomy in the Old Testament; Warren, The Earliest
Cosmologies, 1909.
Under the word
"World” and its
subsection "Hebrew
Idea of the World”, the ISBE states that:
"The world is a solid expanse of earth, surrounded by and
resting on a world-ocean, and surmounted by the 'firmament,' above which the
waters of a heavenly ocean are spread” (Skinner)…. A few passages convey the idea of depths within or
beneath, as well as around the solid earth (Gen. 7:11; Deut. 33:13).
One place in Job (Job 26:7) has the bold idea of the earth as hung in free space - a
near approach to the modern conception… one has only to look at the great ideas
which the first chapter of Genesis is intended to teach to see that it conveys
those great truths on the origin and ordering of things… no matter to what stage
knowledge or science may attain. Science itself is gradually coming to see the
limits within which the doctrine of evolution must be received, and, kept within
these limits, there is nothing in that doctrine which brings it into conflict
with the Biblical representations… [Genesis 1], standing at the head of the
Bible, lays the foundation for all that follows in the Biblical view of the
relation of God to the world, and yields the ground for our confidence that, as
all things are created by God and dependent on Him, so everything in Nature and
providence is at His disposal for the execution of His purposes and the care and
protection of His people.”
The literature that the ISBE
mentions here is: "Earth” in Smith's
DB and in EB. A valuable extended discussion of the word
"Firmament” may be seen in Essay V of the older work, Aids to Faith
(London, Murray), 220-30.
THE FILES THAT
EXISTED IN THE TIMES OF JOB:
In the past there was a
store of teaching available to the enquirer,
"Enquire, I pray thee, of
the former age, and prepare thyself to the search of their fathers” (Job 8:8).
If
Job could "enquire”, and "search” the wisdom of the fathers, it must have
existed in some accessible form. Granted that such wisdom of ancient days was
accessible, it will not appear strange to read words which seem an echo of the
flood (the Deluge), "All flesh shall perish together” (Job 34:15). Dr. Samuel
Lee says of this passage that there are "the very words used of the historian of
that event. See Genesis 6:17; 7:21”. Job also speaks of those angelic beings as
"the sons of God” (38:7) as does the writer of the prose introduction (Job 1:6;
2:1) and of Gen. 6:1-4.
Welch, C. W. "The Book of Job and the
Enigma of the Ages” (Berean Publishing Trust, 1952,
London).
To go to Part 2: http://fdocc.ucoz.com/index/0-103
Thanks to oocities for saving it!: http://www.oocities.com/fdocc3/waterout.htm