Sky-Dome
Sky Dome
One sometimes hears from atheists that the Bible portrays a flat earth covered by a solid sky dome, sort of like an inverted
metal Revere-ware bowl. The Jesus Seminar concurs with this view: "The phrase 'outer darkness' refers
to the region beyond the mountains at the ends of the [flat] earth, mountains that were thought to hold up the sky." (The Five
Gospels, p. 256).
But when one searches for any such structure described in the Bible, it flees away from one's eyes. Devoted Bible-readers, who search
the scriptures daily, do not recall encountering it. Some primitive peoples do describe such a construct. Trouble is, it can
be maddeningly elusive to find any trace of a solid sky-dome in scripture. Bible authors seem unaware it's there: "He stretcheth
out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing." (Job 25:7). It can even seem annoyingly in the way: "And
God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in
the open firmament of heaven." (Genesis 1:20). If 'firmament' is supposed to mean 'solid dome', how do the birds fly "in the open
firmament of heaven"? Do they flip open little pet doors with their beaks?
The atheists assure us we cannot do without this 'dome' if we are to have waters above the sky. They envision
something like a double-hulled super-tanker, water-logged within, with port-holes underneath letting out the water when it rains,
or else something like a bathysphere suspended in a water-bath. Scripture does speak of waters above the sky: "Praise him,
ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that be above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the LORD: for he commanded, and they
were created." (Psalm 148:4-5). What are these waters above the sky? Bible-readers agree: it's the clouds!:
"Ge 1:7
"1:7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which [were] {f} under
the firmament from the waters which [were] above the firmament: and it was so.
(f) As the sea and rivers, from those waters that are in the clouds, which
are upheld by God's power, least they should overwhelm the world." (Geneva Notes).
Is there water above the air? Yes! See those fluffy white things up there. Just look up!
"Moses describes the special use of this expanse, 'to divide the waters from
the waters'...We see that the clouds suspended in the air, which threaten to fall upon our heads, yet leave us space
to breathe...We know, indeed that the rain is naturally produced; but the deluge sufficiently shows how speedily we might be overwhelmed
by the bursting of the clouds, unless the cataracts of heaven were closed by the hand of God. Nor does David rashly
recount this among His miracles, that God 'layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters,' (Ps. 104:31;) and he elsewhere
calls upon the celestial waters to praise God, (Ps. 148:4.) Since, therefore, God has created the clouds, and
assigned them a region above us, it ought not to be forgotten that they are restrained by the power of God, lest, gushing
forth with sudden violence, they should swallow us up: and especially since no other barrier is opposed to them than the liquid and
yielding, air, which would easily give way unless this word prevailed, 'Let there be an expanse between the waters.'" (John
Calvin Commentaries).
(As Calvin points out, every scripture has a natural, literal meaning, beyond which any esoteric readings are to be
looked for. I don't mean to restrict anyone's freedom in finding esoteric senses to these texts, as
some like to do, whether physical or spiritual, but scripture must yield meaning to the simple as well as to the subtle.)
'Let there be a 'firmament', an 'expansion', so the Hebrew word signifies, like
a sheet spread, or a curtain drawn out...The use and design of it -- to 'divide the waters from the waters', that is, to
distinguish between the waters that are wrapped up in the clouds and those that cover the sea. God has, in the
firmament of his power, chambers, store-chambers, whence he 'watereth the earth'." (Matthew Henry Commentaries).
Atheists of the world, look up! There are oceans suspended in air above you!
"...Let there be a firmament -- An expansion; so the Hebrew word signifies...it
reaches as high as the place where the stars are fixed, for that is called here the firmament of heaven, Ge 1:14,15, and
as low as the place where the birds fly for that also is called the firmament of heaven, Ge 1:20...The design of it; to divide
the waters from the waters -- That is, to distinguish between the waters that are wrapt up in the clouds, and those
that cover the sea; the waters in the air, and those in the earth." (Wesley Notes).
Atheists of the world, look up! You have nothing to lose but your illusions!
The word 'firmament' is 'raqiya'. Atheists, going 'behind' God's revelation to the vocabulary of the already existing
human language He employed, claim that on its face this word propounds the 'sky-dome' theory. It means something beaten out, as into
fine gold leaf. This is why the word is often translated 'expanse': "Then God said, 'Let there be an expanse in the midst
of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters." (Genesis 1:6 NASB). In
Biblical meteorology, there is a lower ocean, the surface waters...and an upper ocean,
the clouds: "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..." (Job 38:8-9).
The paramount 'dome' proof-text is Job 37:18: "Hast thou with him spread out the sky, which is strong, and as a molten
looking glass?". But we find similar imagery in modern poets. Was Coleridge a flat-earther?: "All in a hot and copper
sky, The bloody Sun, at noon, Right up above the mast did stand, No bigger than the Moon." (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Rime
of the Ancient Mariner). What I think Coleridge meant by his "copper sky" is the shimmery, scintillating appearance of
a blindingly hot day when it is almost hurtful to look at the bright, searing sky, even away from the sun itself. Poets
signify this by visualizing the sky itself as a burnished reflector of highly polished metal: a "molten looking glass".
The Bible uses a range of descriptive imagery of the sky, including tents, curtains, fabric scrims, and garments:
"And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled
together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from
the fig tree." (Isaiah 34:4);
"Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment: who stretchest out the heavens
like a curtain:..." (Psalms 104:2);
"And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of theearth; and the heavens are the works
of thine hands: they shall perish;but thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment; and as
a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but thou
art the same, and thy years shall not fail." (Hebrews 1:10-12).
So are these 'competing theories': the 'scroll' theory, the 'curtain' theory, and the 'garment' theory? Or just
mixed metaphors? None of the apocalyptic authors describe the banging and denting required to trash a metallic dome; had they
imagined there to be any such structure, they would have been obliged to bring suitable means to bear to demolish it. Yet
there's no mention of taking a wrecking ball to any solid 'sky dome'. Which is hardly surprising; probably they didn't even know
it was there...which it isn't.
Another 'sky-dome' proof-text is Genesis 7:11-12: "In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month,
the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven
were opened. And the rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights."
So what could "windows of heaven" be but port-holes in a metallic sky dome, flung open to let out the rain, right?
Well, no. We say the exact same thing when it starts to pour: 'Who opened the flood-gates?', etc. The Bible authors
were perfectly well aware rain falls from clouds:
"And it came to pass in the mean while, that the heaven was black with clouds
and wind, and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel." (1 Kings 18:45);
"The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went
abroad." (Psalms 77:17);
"By his knowledge the depths are broken up, and the clouds drop down the dew."
(Proverbs 3:20);
"If the clouds be full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth: and if the
tree fall toward the south, or toward the north, in the place
where the tree falleth, there it shall be." (Ecclesiastes 11:3);
"He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under
them." (Job 26:8);
"For he maketh small the drops of water: they pour down rain according to the vapour
thereof: Which the clouds do drop and distil upon man abundantly."
(Job 36:27-28).
The clouds are the heavenly water jars: "Who can number the clouds in wisdom? or who can stay the
bottles of heaven..." (Job 38:37). If they knew anything about the theory that rain was supposed to fall through these
little trap-doors in the 'sky dome', why did they ascribe rain to the clouds instead? No Bible author ever describes rain falling
from a clear blue sky, yet that ought to be possible under the atheists' 'sky dome' theory.
But surely the phrase 'the ends of the earth' must call to mind a Christmas snow-globe, with disk-shaped earth slumbering
beneath a hemispherical sky? Well, no. Do you know there are people living at the "ends of the earth" -- and do you know we, the Gentiles,
are they? Far from being a cartoony construct bounding a little snow-globe earth, the "ends of the earth" are the farthest inhabited
regions: "For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for
salvation unto the ends of the earth." (Acts 13:47); "All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all
the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee." (Psalms 22:27). The Bible presents a tri-partite world: sky, earth, and
sea. One of the early English translations of Psalms rendered 'ends of the earth' as 'uttermost coasts'.
Likewise with the phrase 'four corners of the earth', still employed to this day in travel brochures. I suspect its
origin lies in the four compass points. And besides, wasn't there supposed to be a disk beneath this 'sky dome', and since when
do disks have corners? Can't the atheists make up their minds?
All the phrases the Bible uses to describe features of the world system are observable features of the world, not
cartoony snow-globe constructs no one has ever seen. The "pillars of heaven" are the mountains. The 'deeps' are the ocean depths.
People have walked through them: "He rebuked the Red sea also, and it was dried up: so he led them through the depths, as through
the wilderness." (Psalm 106:9). Jonah, thrown overboard, found himself in 'the depth': "For thou hadst cast me into the deep,
in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then said, I am cast
out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth [08415]
closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head." (Jonah 2:3-5). Pharaoh's forces were drowned in the 'depths':
"Pharaoh's chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea: his chosen captains also are drowned in the Red sea. The depths [08415]
have covered them: they sank into the bottom as a stone." (Exodus 15:4-5). Did Pharaoh's chariots and soldiers wander to some never-never
fairy-land, or were they just covered up with water?
It's features of the Biblical world like 'the deep' which are the Lego building blocks of the atheists' 'sky dome'
toy universe. Yet when we examine how the Bible itself actually employs these terms, we encounter only observable features of
the world, naturalistically described.
Advocates of the 'sky dome' theory assume that there was one ancient world view, so that material
may be ported from Babylonian mythology into the Bible. But there wasn't one 'ancient' world view, there were a bewildering
variety; every pre-Socratic philosopher constructed a different model. For instance, the fourth century B.C. saw Epicurus' infinite
universe: "Moreover, the universe as a whole is infinite, for whatever is limited has an outermost edge to limit it, and such
an edge is defined by something beyond. Since the universe does not have an edge, it has no limit; and since it lacks a limit,
it is infinite and unbounded...Finally, the number of worlds, some like ours and some unlike, is also infinite. For the atoms
are infinite in number...There is nothing therefore that will stand in the way of there being an infinite number of worlds."
(Epicurus, Letters, Principal Doctrines, and Vatican Sayings, II. The Universe, 41b-45b, p. 11-13). There were cylindrical models...and
Pythagoras' spherical earth, which grew increasingly popular.
Some of the features the atheists ascribe to their beloved 'sky dome' are novel. The stars, we hear, are supposed
to be little spangles stuck to the underside of said 'sky dome'. But even the Babylonians, acclaimed by atheists as the paradigmatic
'sky-domers', didn't believe that. Notice Gilgamesh call the stars the 'Watchmen': "...and command also the Watchmen of the Night,
the stars, and at night your father, Sin [Moon]." (Gilgamesh, Tablet III, 57-58).
Pagans tended to deify the stars, rather than reduce them to sparkly little spangles hung on the underside of a sky
dome: "Surely vain are all men by nature, who are ignorant of God, and could not out of the good things that are seen know him
that is: neither by considering the works did they acknowledge the workmaster; But deemed either fire, or wind, or the swift
air, or the circle of the stars, or the violent water, or the lights of heaven, to be the gods which govern the world.
With whose beauty if they being delighted took them to be gods; let them know how much better the Lord of them is: for the first
author of beauty hath created them. But if they were astonished at their power and virtue, let them understand by them, how much
mightier he is that made them." (Wisdom of Solomon 13:1-4).
To hear the atheists tell it, the Jews learned 'sky dome' astronomy from the Babylonians. But far from sitting
eagerly at the feet of their imagined Babylonian instructors, the Jews could be at times downright critical: "Thou art wearied
in the multitude of thy counsels. Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save thee
from these things that shall come upon thee." (Isaiah 47:13). If they were eager students of Babylonian astronomy, why reject
astrology, not yet differentiated into a separate field?
Not only were they downright critical, you could almost swear at times they didn't even like the Babylonians:
"O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us. Happy shall he
be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones." (Psalm 137:8-9).
Though the atheists assure us there's a point-by-point correspondence between the Babylonian world-view and the Bible,
it can be maddeningly difficult to find any point of correspondence at all. The Babylonians told a detailed story of the construction
of the universe, involving the dismemberment of a deceased lady's corpse. Tiamat, the primeval ocean goddess, was ripped in half,
an atrocity of war: "He [Marduk] shot an arrow which pierced her belly, split her down the middle and slit her heart, vanquished
her and extinguished her life. He threw down her corpse and stood on top of her." (The Epic of Creation Tablet IV). He then assembled
the world as we know it from this lady's dismembered carcass: "He opened the Euphrates and the Tigris from her eyes, closed
her nostrils,...He piled up clear-cut mountains from her udder, bored waterholes to drain off the catchwater." (Ibid.) Half of
her goes to make the sky, half the earth. Though the text is fragmented, it would appear rain-clouds arise from the deceased lady's spittle:
"The spittle of Tiamat...Marduk...He put into groups and made clouds scud. Raising winds, making rain, Making fog billow, by
collecting her poison..." (Ibid.) By the way, where is our looked-for metallic 'sky-dome' with trap-doors? Did this lady have body parts
made out of metal, like Robo-Cop?
Nor is there only one Babylonian creation myth, but multiple choice. Did the world we see result from the dismemberment
of the primeval sea-goddess, Tiamat? Or from a plow breaking the ground: "At the very beginning (?) [Plough married Earth] And
they [decided to establish (?)] a family (?) and dominion. 'We shall break up the virgin soil of the land into clods.' In the
clods of their virgin soil (?), they created Sea." (Theogony of Dunnu). So in this Babylonian myth, 'Sea' is a creation
of the primal progenitors Earth and Plough. There's yet another text which lists Anu the sky-god as creator, earth arising from
sky. And for that matter, I've yet to find one which mentions any metallic sky dome...
Praise Him...you waters above the heavens!
The waters above the sky are of typological significance in the Bible:
The Bible
Golden Age of Atheism
"The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." (Psalm 14:1).
Atheism is older than the proclamation of the gospel, dating back to before the fifth century B.C.:
- "Protagoras of Abdera, the son of Menander, said that there are no
gods, and that God does not exist at all."
- "Diogenes of Smyrna, or some say he was from Cyrene, held the same
opinions as Protagoras."
- "Theodorus, who is called the atheist, said that discussion of God
is silly. For he believed that there is nothing divine, and therefore urged
everyone to steal, forswear themselves, rob, and not die for their countries."
- (Epiphanius, De Fide VII, 9,20-21, 28).
- "...with reason did the Athenians adjudge Diagoras guilty of atheism, in that he not
only divulged the Orphic doctrine, and published the mysteries of Eleusis and of the Cabiri, and chopped up the wooden statue of Hercules
to boil his turnips, but openly declared that there was no God at all."
- (Athenagoras, A Plea for the Christians, Chapter 4).
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The twentieth century was the golden age of atheism, with many states proclaiming
themselves officially atheist. The socialist program however failing to
deliver the groceries, most of these states ultimately collapsed.
During the twentieth century western academia was persuaded to adopt a
world view which might seem to have been invented by a billy goat pondering
in the fields: that sex is the end-all and be-all of life. This concept
was perceived by its adherents as liberating, and imagined to be conducive
to mental health. Has ever any little tribe lost on an island made itself
ridiculous in quite this manner?
Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong dreamed of what a paradise this world would
be, if only you could get rid of all the religious people:
- "Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
- "Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
- "You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one.
- "Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
- "You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one."
- (John Lennon, 'Imagine').
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But for all of atheism's institutional entrenchment in the academic and
entertainment realms, only 3 per cent of the population so self-identify.
Thus better things may be hoped for the twenty-first century.
Mass Murder
The New Testament prescribes shunning heretics, not murder:
"If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive
him into your house nor greet him; for he who greets him shares in his evil deeds." (2 John 1:10-11).
When and why did things change?
In classical antiquity, inquirers such as Aristotle opined that the world
is eternal. The Bible said it was not. Nonbelievers no longer argue the
point, but continue to find fault. How does the Bible itself define a 'day'?
Why Doesn't It Work?
Oh, but it does. King Hezekiah, in sickness, prayed for a cure:
Modern-day believers do not report King Hezekiah's 15 additional years
of life, but rather seven and a half:
"Research conducted partly at the University of Colorado at Boulder
has found that regular churchgoers live longer than people who seldom or
never attend worship services. For the first time, that extra lifespan
has been quantified. While there are differences between genders and races,
in general those who go to church once or more each week can look forward
to about seven more years than those who never attend.
"Life expectancy beyond age 20 averages another 55.3 years, to age 75, for those who never attend church compared to
another 62.9 years, age 83, for those who go more than once a week." (Science Daily, May 17, 1999)
The researchers made an effort to isolate the effect of religiosity on
health, rather than to belabor the already well-known facts that smoking,
excessive drinking and drug use are bad for your health. Irreligiosity
in and of itself, it turns out, is bad for your health.
Atheists will exercise their imaginations to find psychological explanations
for this and other similar results. But theists already have a simple and sound explanation.
It might interest atheists to see how closely their ideas conform to those
of the unfaithful remnant camped out amidst the ruins of declining churches:
- "'We no longer turn to God for answers as to why the skies drop hail
or why plagues spread. Science has answered those questions,' Brown said."
- (On His Home Turf, Public Discussion: Dan Brown (author of the Da Vinci
Code), Maine Sunday Telegram, April 30, 2006, p. E3).
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