zotero/storage/PLX5ARVX/.zotero-ft-cache

GEOCENTRICITY: CHRISTIANITY IN THE
WOODSHED
Gerardus D. Bouw, Ph.D.
The Association for Biblical Astronomy Cleveland, Ohio

GEOCENTRICITY: CHRISTIANITY IN THE
WOODSHED
by
Gerardus D. Bouw, Ph.D.
The Association for Biblical Astronomy Cleveland, Ohio

© Copyright 2013 by Gerardus D. Bouw All rights reserved
ISBN: 9781890120900
Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2013943867 Unless otherwise noted, all Bible quotations in this book are from the Authorized Version o f Holy Bible, commonly called the King James Version. Any deviation therefrom is purely accidental.
Printed in the United States o f America
Publisher: Daystar Publishing P.O. Box 464 Miamitown, Ohio 45041 U.S.A.
Daystarpublishing@yahoo.com http://geocentricity.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface............................................................................................. i
Chapter 1: Introduction....................................................................1 Chapter 2: The Importance o f Geocentricity................................... 8 Chapter 3: The Bible and the Flat Earth....................................... 16 Chapter 4: The Motions o f the World............................................ 35 Chapter 5: The Motions o f the Earth............................................. 43
Chapter 6: The Biblical Firmament............................................... 52 C hapter 7: The Sun To Rule by D a y.............................................. 90 Ch2upt^r Joshua's Long D a y................................................... 110 C\v2upi^r 9\ Hezekiah's Sign......................................................... 146 Chapter 10: Christological Sun Passages................................. 161
Chapter 11: Sunrise and Sunset.................................................. 168 C hapter 12: The Throne.............................................................. 180 Chapter 13: Up and Down........................................................... 203 Chapter 14: Alleged Heliocentric Verses..................................... 210 C hapter 15: Sweet Influences...................................................... 215
Chapter 16: Mazzaroth................................................................ 226 Chapter 17: The Ordinances o fHeaven...................................... 233 Chapter 18: He Hangeth the Earth Upon Nothing......................239 Chapter 19: Early Geocentric Models......................................... 243 C hapter 20: The Birth o f Heliocentrism...................................... 253

TABLE OF CONTENTS (Continued)
Chapter 21: The Reformation and Heliocentrism........................270 Chapter 22: The Early Copernicans............................................. 288 Chapter 23: Heliocentrism Takes O ver........................................ 315 Chapter 24: The Restoration o fAstronomy Project......................327 Chapter 25: Geocentrists From 1650 to 1950............................ 348
Chapter 26: Newton and Berkeley................................................ 398 Chapter 27: Force-Based Proofs o f the Newtonians................... 414 Chapter 28: Proofs Based on Centrifugal Force..........................419 Chapter 29: Proofs Based on the Coriolis F orce........................ 431 Chapter 30: Introduction to Optical Proofs..................................440
Chapter 31: Aberration.................................................................448 Chapter 32: Aberration—Airy's Failure....................................... 455 Chapter 33: Aberration— The Gospel o f Relativity..................... 466 Chapter 34: Aberration— The Michelson-Morley Experiment 495 Chapter 35: Rotation..................................................................... 521
C \ i 2 u ^ t t Y L e s s e r Evidences .................................................... 533 Chapter 37: The Axis o fE v il.........................................................557 Chapter 38: Modern Geocentrists................................................ 570 Chapter 39: Geocentrists and Their Critics.................................652 Chapter 40: In the Woodshed.........................................................677

TABLE OF CONTENTS (Continued)
Appendix A: On the Hebrew Word, "Mowt"................................683 Appendix B: Sunrise/Sunset Passages .......................................689 Appendix C: All Significant Geocentric Scriptures....................690 Appendix D: "The Sun Does Move" by James Jasper.................719 Appendix E: Derivation o f the Geocentric Equations for a
Daily-Rotating Universe......................................... 740
Chapter Notes ..............................................................................748 Scripture Index...............................................................................776 General Index.................................................................................780

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DEDICATION
This book would not have been possible without literally hundreds of people who have encouraged its publication. Among those who are no longer with us is Walter van der Kamp whose insight into Scripture spawned the modem geocentric movement. Walter laid a solid philosophical foundation for geocentricity and founded the Tychonian Society, from whose newsletter the theory o f geocentricity was bom. Then, too, there is the late Walter Lang, who, at the encouragement of James Hanson, gave Walter van der Kamp the fomm he needed to promote the Tychonian Society.
Special thanks go to Professor and mathematician James Hanson, whose friendship not only led me to a career but also continues to be a tmstworthy mathematical sounding board. Others who have assisted in various way include; John Byl, Ph.D. (Astronomy) who has provided valuable critiques of the Theory of Geocentricity; Martin Selbrede, who contributed his valuable insights into modem cosmological thinking; Gordon Bane, who provided past financial support and encouragement which tmly gave the theory o f geocentricity global exposure; Frank Wolff, Ph.D. who helped to complete the book and get it printed and published; and also Floyd Jones for proofing the book “with a fine­ toothed comb.”
I would be greatly amiss if I did not thank Beth, my wife of more than thirty years for her patience and moral support, particularly over the last seven years when most of my focus was on completing the book. She also did the early proofreadings of the book.
Lastly, but certainly not least, I thank my Lord Jesus, and his Father and mine, and the Holy Ghost for the grace freely given unto me, and for the many wonderful things that they created that I have seen and have yet to see. Thank you for the riches that are mine in Christ Jesus, even eternal life. May the things that are incorrect in this book be soon forgotten so that only tmth remains.

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Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradi­ tion of men, after the rudiments o f the world, and not after Christ.
— Colossians 2:8
PREFACE
Time was not that long ago that most houses had a woodshed to house seasoned firewood for the winter. But the woodshed served a couple of other purposes besides storing firewood. Being well separated from the house, the woodshed offered some privacy to boys and girls wanting a private location to do something naughty or forbidden. If you wanted to smoke, you could bum a cigarette and matches and go behind the woodshed to light up. The woodshed was a place of naughtiness, but it was also a place of punishment. Inside the woodshed it was usually the father who applied the board o f education to the seat o f learning.
Now don’t misunderstand me. It is not my role to administer any punishment; that is our Father’s responsibility. In the entire New Testament there is not any mention, or even the suggestion, that Bible believers are to execute anyone for any sin. The greatest punishments we can inflict are ostracism and turning someone over to Satan that he may learn not to blaspheme. Even heresy is to be punished by excommunication, not execution. So my role in this book is to explain why Christianity is today near death and how she earned that fate. Mine is a call to repentance, to admonish all who may be convicted by this book to turn to the Lord Jesus Christ, whose Scripture has been banished from nearly every local church that claims his name. Whether you believe me or not is of no credit to me. I’m just the messenger exposing what Christianity did in secret behind the woodshed some four centuries ago.
The Reformation of the sixteenth century was a time when men chose to subject the traditions of churches and men to the

ii Preface
norms of Scripture. God’s words were to overrule men’s. The Reformation set men free through the truth of Scripture and set men at liberty, the liberty that can only be found under grace.
But it was also a time when the newfound freedom of thought allowed the religion of humanism to break free from the confines of the Church of Rome. Humanism (not to be confused with humanitarianism) is a religion that sets man over God and self above mankind. Marxism, Socialism, and Communism are prime exam­ ples of the humanist religion in bloom.
Since the vast majority of people prefer fiction to fact, human­ ism has always promoted itself and conquered through lies, as op­ posed to Scripture which commands all to walk in the Truth.
The lie that the humanists devised to promote their god over the God of the Holy Bible was subtle enough to deceive all the world’s religions, including today’s Fundamentalist scholars, since its inception. The lie started to work early in the sixteenth century when a Polish cleric, Nicolas Copernicus, discovered that a third century B.C. Greek philosopher names Aristarchus of Samos pro­ posed that the earth was not at rest at the center of the universe but that, instead, the sun was located at the center of the universe. His model was called “the heliocentric system” because it placed the sun god Helios at the center. Heliocentrism went nowhere; the geocentric universe, which had been held as fact since the creation, remained unscathed by its heliocentric rival.
Copernicus, however, saw in Aristarchus’ supposition the downfall of Scripture, and, knowing that his idea was heretical to Christianity, sought an occasion to publish it without endangering or inconveniencing his life with the Church of Rome. Copernicus did so when he knew his death was imminent in 1543.
The Copemicans’ assault on Scripture did not attack any doc­ trine considered vital to Christianity. Instead, it focused on a doc­ trine that most Christians would consider disposable; the fixity of the earth. In those days everyone recognized that Scripture teaches that the earth neither rotates on an axis nor orbits the sun once a year. The Humanist Copernicus, the Protestant Kepler, and the Roman Catholic Galileo all promoted heliocentrism. All deflected

Preface iii

Bible-based objections to the heliocentric model by claiming:

“Scripture teaches us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens

go.”

Galileo fell afoul of the Church of Rome by demanding that

she adopt the heliocentric model as a proven fact. Rome refused

on the grounds that all the evidence, as well as Scripture, still fa­

vored the geocentric universe. Indeed, there was no evidence at all

for the heliocentric model. Although the Catholic Church repri­

manded Galileo for his arrogance in dictating what she must do,

the Pope gave him a nice villa and a comfortable pension for life.

Even after Galileo was called before the Inquisition a second time

for insulting the Pope and breaking the promise he made after the

first inquisition, Galileo’s pension and villa were not taken away.

Today, no one believes the model Galileo insisted upon that the

Church of Rome must adopt—that the sun is at the center of the

universe—but in 1991 the Pope apologized to Galileo for persecut­

ing him.

By 1650, without any scientific evidence to support it, the he­

liocentric heresy had won the hearts of the learned men. Scripture

was no longer an authority in physical matters (the “how the heav­

ens go” in the above quote) and the assault against Scripture’s au­

thority in every other field of knowledge (the “how to go to

101

heaven” part of the quote) was being questioned. Today, Scripture

is no longer an authority on anything among the learned men.

In the early eighteenth century the founding of higher criticism

of the Bible came to fruition with a French humanist named Jean

Astruc. (It is called “higher criticism” because it sounds more au­

thoritative, more impressive than “criticism” by itself) Higher

criticism was the direct result of the Copemican Revolution’s at­

tack on the Bible. Having cast doubt on the infallibility of Scrip­

ture in the sciences by discrediting the doctrine of the stability of

the earth, the attack thus moved to combat the credibility of Scrip­

ture upon all areas it touches.

The Copemican Revolution had changed the concept of revo­

lution forever. It had created a cause to rally the humanists as well

as other haters of God against the Bible and his God. The Coper-

iv Preface
nican Revolution had done so by removing the earth from its spe­ cial place, at rest in the midst of heaven, and reduced it to the status of a planet: a wandering star (Jude 13). You see, before the Copemican Revolution, the earth was not considered a planet; it was the hub of creation, which meant that trying to move it was like trying to move the entire universe. Furthermore, if people ac­ tually believed that the earth was an insignificant planet orbiting a below-average star, as we are taught today, then mankind, too, could easily be stripped of its God-given liberty, the Holy Bible (the word liberty means “by the book,” that is, God’s book; think “lib” as in library). With that liberty gone, man is left with hope­ less despair, having the right questions but no answers (existential­ ism).
The French Revolution was a direct result of Copemicanism. Although it had been encouraged, in part, by the American Revolu­ tion there was one huge difference. The French revolutions were all based on humanism (socialism in particular), whereas the American Revolution was republican in nature and was based on certain scriptural principles. With the French Revolution the au­ thority of the European Reformation Bibles was pretty well gone. Only Britain and America still held the Bible in esteem.
Britain’s downfall started in the early 1800s with Charles Lyell, and English lawyer and member of the London Geological Society. Lyell wanted to gain power by fomenting a revolution in England just like the French Revolution and based on the same humanistic principles. In order to do that he had to depose the monarchy and thought his best chance for that was to rid England of its Bible. He decided to attack the evidence supporting a worldwide flood, that is Noah’s flood. In his three-volume book. The Principles o f Geology, Lyell put forth what he knew was a lie, namely, that the present is the key to the past. This is called the “Uniformitarian principle” meaning that noticeable changes will take a very, very long time. The uniformitarian principle is the foundation of all evolutionary speculations. It claims that great catastrophic events covering significant portions of the globe are impossible. In short, evolution is based on another humanist lie.

Preface

Charles Darwin applied Lyell’s uniformitarian principle to zo­

ology. Darwin confessed that without the Copemican Revolution

his speculations would never have seen the light of day. The Ger­

man Karl Marx applied Darwin’s principles to politics and eco­

nomics. He, too, acknowledged his indebtedness to the Copemi­

can Revolution.

The Austrian Friedrich Nietsche noted that evolution means

that people are evolving to a super man. Hitler, in Mein Kampf

expanded that to a super race. At the same time the eugenics pro­

grams of Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, imple­

mented steps to eradicate the Negroid race.

These are the consequences of the Copemican Revolution.

But what of the scientific evidence? After all, we are taught that

heliocentrism has been proven.

While the aforementioned events were happening in the nine­

teenth century, there were troubling experiments being conducted

in the field of physics. Some circumstantial phenomena tending to

support heliocentrism were discovered in the eighteenth and nine­

teenth centuries, but starting in the early nineteenth century three

experiments were performed that were designed to directly meas­

ure the speed of the earth through space.

The first experiment was Arago’s starlight experiment which

failed to show earth’s motion around the sun. The second experi­

ment was related to Arago’s, but on a grander scale, and was con­

ducted by Britain’s Astronomer Royal, George Airy. It, too,

measured a speed of zero. The third experiment is called the

“Michelson-Morley experiment.” It, too, measured a speed of

IM

zero.

For eighty-six years, physicists tried various explanations that

would allow the heliocentric model to be tme while all the evi­

dence says it is false. Physicists finally settled on Einstein’s theory

of Relativity as the way to keep the earth moving while making it

look as if it stands still. What Einstein did was radical. He in­

vented a geometry that allows every thing in the universe to re­

spond to experiments as if it alone is located, immobile, at the cen­

ter of the universe. The result is that there is no way to scientifi-

vi Preface
cally determine whether the earth is rotating or orbiting the sun. Physics has thus failed to disproved Scripture when it states that the earth is unmovable. Indeed, the insistence of Scripture that the creation is geocentric plus the fundamental experimental results confirming Scripture led Albert Einstein to invent an absurdity so great that he could legitimately claim that he was himself located immobile at the center of creation. Furthermore, it is impossible to falsify Einstein’s relativity. Yet, despite all the evidence, Christian scientists still refuse to accept Scripture over humanism’s counter­ feit science.
To go back to Christianity in the woodshed: it is now clear that the rejection of the scriptural doctrine of the stability of the earth was a needless objection. We also see that the fruit of the Copemican Revolution brought great turmoil, pain, suffering and death to the world. All of this will fall on those who add, subtract, or change the words of God as recorded in his Holy Bible. This is SO Stated in Revelation 22:18-19. It is addressed to Christians, both true and counterfeit, who tamper with God’s words. On them the wrath of God will fall most heavily for they should have known better.
Consider their effect on professing Christians since 1870. The churches and their members still profess faith in the word of God, the Holy Bible. But these days such a profession means absolutely nothing. There are more than 230 different bible versions in circu­ lation in the United States; not one of them professes to be Scrip­ ture given by inspiration of God. Which one is truly the word of God? “Pick the one you prefer or like the most,” is the typical an­ swer to that question.
The problem is that, in America, the Bible was kicked out of almost every facet of life. It was kicked out of our economy in
* Revelation 22:18-19— For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book o f this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

Preface vii
1913 resulting in the establishment of the Federal Reserve. Amer­ ica’s entertainment industry never had any respect for Scripture. The Ten Commandments were kicked out of our legal system by 1958 for fear that our children might read them and obey them. Our government rid itself the Bible in 1962, and our schools told God to “Get lost” in 1963.
But before God was eliminated from those listed institutions, God’s word. The Holy Bible, was expelled from this nation’s churches. That happened in 1901, when with much fanfare and acceptance, even among the laity, the American Standard Version was introduced to replace the so-called “obsolete, most inaccurate, archaic” Authorized Version commonly called “The King James Version.”
How all these things came about is the subject of this book. It documents how humanists (which are characterized by their claim of superiority over God and everyone else) tricked the churches, their clergy, and their members into abandoning the authority of Scripture in the natural realm. This was accomplished by convinc­ ing Bible-believing Christians that some doctrines are essential and others are not. Once that was accepted by the believers, they were ready to abandon what was claimed to be a minor doctrine of Scripture. Even today, either said doctrine is regarded as a minor doctrine or dismissed as not a doctrine at all.
There was a time when Bible believers understood that no doctrine in Scripture is minor. The idea that some doctrines are more important than others is the foundation of Fundamentalism. Fundamentalism was founded on the proposition that conservative churches of different denominations, working together, could de­ feat liberalism by banding together to defend the alleged “essen­ tial” doctrines. It is no wonder that Fundamentalism had abso­ lutely no effect on the growth of liberalism; on the contrary, liber­ alism infected Fundamentalism with the anti-biblical notion that only the original autographs are (were) inspired. Since we don’t have them, there is no authoritative word of God. Truth is, without the originals you wouldn’t recognize them if you could reconstruct

viii Preface
them. All these are the fruit of rejecting the “disposable” doctrine, the doctrine of the immobility of the earth, namely, Geocentricity.
In this book we will show that the churches were fooled, mis­ taken in rejecting the geocentric doctrine, that every fundamental experiment ever conducted to measure the speed of the earth through space has always returned a speed of zero. We will also present evidence that the earth is near, if not at, the center of the cosmos; and that the cosmos even knows this to be true. We also explore the firmament and the role it plays in keeping the earth still in the cosmos.
This book is written for you who are truly bom-again believ­ ers. If you love sound Bible doctrine, this book is for you; it will edify you and strengthen your faith. If you have ever wondered about the foundation of God’s creation or had an interest in cos­ mology or cosmogony, this book is for you. If you’ve wondered why God created us, this book is for you. And for those of you mature in the faith who, in the Laodicean church, find no room ex­ cept to stand outside with Jesus knocking on its door, this book is definitely for you.
Finally, some things herein are hard to understand. Over the past years and editions I have bathed it with much prayer, but that does not help your faith or understanding, dear reader. I thus leave you with this prayer:
Gracious Lord and Father, I ask for the sake of the words and blood of Jesus that thou wouldst grant a special blessing and grace to all who read this book. I ask a special blessing so that they may read with a mind full of peace, edifying their souls; and I ask for grace that by thy grace the eyes of their under­ standing may be opened and that their hearts may be drawn closer to thee. And if there be any glory, it is thine, O Lord. Amen.
Mantua, 31 January 2013

Accommodation: the supposition which claims that God goes along with the com­ monly accepted story even though he really doesn’t believe it.
— Pastor David Robinson
INTRODUCTION
Four hundred years ago there raged a debate among the learned men of Europe about whether or not the earth orbits the sun. Until then, it was commonly accepted that the sun, moon, stars, and planets were embedded in crystalline spheres centered on the earth. In the debate, the Biblicists held that the sun goes around the earth once a day as well as revolving about it once a year. The secularists maintained that the earth daily rotates on an axis and orbits the sun once a year. This Biblicist view, originally called Geocentrism, believed that the earth is at the center of the universe; the humanist view, called Heliocentrism, believed the sun to be at the center of the universe. Although to this day the historical, suncentered heliocentric view is taught as correct, no one believes it today. Instead, today’s science claims that there is no center to the universe or that the center of the universe is everywhere. The no­ center belief is called Acentrism; the center-is-everywhere view is properly called Pancentrism.
When geocentrism (the idea that the earth is stationary at the center of the universe) was finally pronounced dead, humanists triumphantly declared their victory signified the death of the Bible and Christianity. However, the victory was not total, for there have always been supporters of geocentrism until this very day. Among the most famous and capable of the early geocentric de­ fenders are Tycho Brahe and three generations of the Parisian as­ tronomers, Cassini.

2 Chapter 1
In the latter half of the twentieth century, geocentrism resur­ faced in a new, far more technical form called Geocentricity. Among its advocates and supporters, one finds several with earned Ph.D.s in astronomy, mathematics, and physics. Currently, three worldwide organizations serve the geocentric community. All three are mathematically sophisticated and have Ph.D.s on their boards, if not as directors. The oldest is the Tychonian Society, now called the Association for Biblical Astronomy (ABA). It is under the directorship of Gerardus D. Bouw, who has an earned Ph.D. in astronomy. The Association’s geocentric stance is based entirely on Scripture although it can argue on evidence and scien­ tific grounds, too. On the heels of the Tychonian Society came the Cercle Scientifique et Historique (CESHE) which maintains of­ fices in Belgium and France. Its chairman is Yves Nourissat. The two groups differ on whether the earth rotates on its axis and the size of the universe. CESHE believes that the earth rotates and that the universe is small; the ABA believes that the earth does not rotate and that the universe can be as large as modem science be­ lieves it to be. CESHE is devoutly Roman Catholic and was or­ ganized to promote the works of Fr. Fernand Crombette. The third global geocentric organization is Galileo Was Wrong. Founded and directed by Robert Sungenis, Ph.D., the organization is Catho­ lic and founds itself on the teachings of the Abbess Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179).
Now the typical reader may be puzzled by the resurgence of an old, “long-dead” idea. After all, has science not proven that the earth rotates on its axis once a day and orbits the sun once a year? Why bring up something that was disproved centuries ago? The scriptural argument against Scripture’s geocentric view is one of accommodation; but that makes a liar of God as noted in our chap­ ter quote by Pastor David Robertson:
Accommodation is the supposition which claims that God goes along with the commonly accepted story even though he really doesn’t believe it.

Introduction 3
At issue is the authority, infallibility, and preservation of Holy Scripture, especially in the light of the pronouncements of science to the contrary. At stake is the authority of the Bible in all realms it touches on: on science, history, politics, law, and government, on morality, truth, the way, and life. The abandonment of the author­ ity of Scripture in the minds of men by the supposed victory of sci­ ence over the geocentric view of Scripture directly led to the de­ cline of Western civilization that we are now experiencing.
So, is geocentricity the anti-scientific myth that its opponents claim? Is it actually a throwback to the flat earth? Is it the case, as one creationist claims, that geocentrists are heretics teaching an end-time heresy? Or is there something to geocentricity, after all? The truth is that every fundamental experiment ever devised to measure the speed of the earth through space measures a speed of zero. Furthennore, there is no difference between the equations describing the causes and motions of the geocentric universe and those describing the causes and motions in the modem heliocentric universe. (This should be obvious to the reader, for both heliocen­ tric and geocentric theories have to explain the same behavior, namely, the behavior our senses and instmments see.) The modem heliocentric theory acknowledges the geocentric equation (called the kinematic equation) as valid but claims that it is unphysical. To make the kinematic equation physical, all modem physics does is to multiply it by one. After multiplying the right-hand side of the “unphysical” kinematic equation by one, modem physics calls the “new” equation dynamic and claims that their multiplication by one has made a physical difference. In other words, the kinematic equation describes the motions of the sun, moon, and stars as they appear to our eyes, but after we multiply the equation’s left-hand side by one, we now “see” the heliocentric “tmth.” (See Appendix E.) If the “geocentric” kinematic equation is fictitious, then so is heliocentrism dynamic equation. Likewise, if the Heliocentrist wants to charge geocentricity as unphysical, then for the same rea­ son, the geocentrist can dismiss heliocentrism as an anti-scientific myth.

4 Chapter 1
Yes, the so-called proofs for the rotation of the earth and its orbit around the sun are all due to the imagined difference between kinematic and dynamic physics. The “one,” the “unity” by which either side of the kinematic equation is multiplied is m/m, where m is the mass. Clearly, the m’s cancel, and we are left with the kine­ matic model as the fundamental equation. What this all boils down to is that in both heliocentric and geocentric models the mass is irrelevant in describing the motions (accelerations) of the planets, but the mass is relevant in computing the gravitational or inertial forces.
From the birth of modem heliocentrism to this day, its driving principle, its episteme, has always been to remove God from his creation, to make him irrelevant. In order to keep the faith of this episteme, the ends justify the means, even if those means are stu­ pid or insipid. As in politics, in the humanistic, atheistic science that Paul calls “Science falsely so called” in I Timothy 6:20, tmth is the first fatality. Since tmth is eternal and absolute, it will not stay dead. So the phony scientist must bury it under an avalanche of alleged proofs, of supposed evidence, of sophisticated argu­ ments, and a mountain of bluster, threats, and name calling. And so it is to this day.
The more subtle physicists, many of whom know well that the geocentric evidence is overwhelming, will claim, with some justi­ fication, that we can neither prove nor disprove the geocentric uni­ verse; but that we likewise can neither prove nor disprove the nongeocentric universe either. The most sophisticated argument de­ signed against the geocentric universe is the theory of relativity. Einstein’s relativity theory makes every point in the universe look as if it is at rest at the center of the universe. The sophisticates can then argue that the geocentrists’ argument is trivial since Mars could be at the center of the universe just as likely as earth.
The problem facing the relativists is that relativity was in­ vented to keep the earth moving around the sun when every fun­ damental experiment showed it to be at rest in the universe. That evidence is so overwhelming that some physicists have concluded that physics conspires to make it look like the earth is fixed at the

Introduction
dynamic center of the universe. A conspiraey on the part of phys­ ics? Not unless physics is a person and the only person with the power to be behind such a conspiracy is God. I find it easier to believe that there is no conspiraey; that physics merely reflects the true state of affairs of God’s creation!
About the Book
In this book we document the development of these arguments designed to keep the earth in orbit about the sun, and the argu­ ments against the rotation of the earth. We will also cover theories designed to explain away the geocentric system or, at least, to hide the faet that we are looking at a geocentric universe. The most fa­ mous of these theories is called Mach’s Principle, which makes geocentricity as plausible as any other center. Along the way we will diseover that the firmament is not synonymous with the uni­ verse but is a superdense medium that pervades all of space. It is the firmament that dictates the laws of physics, and it is the firma­ ment that physically controls all motion. Such considerations con­ stitute the substanee of this book.
I mentioned the atheistie, humanistic scientists earlier, but not all opponents of the geocentric universe are atheists. For instance, the man who first proposed the physics-conspiraey theory to ex­ plain the physical evidence for geoeentricity is a professing Bible believer. Their arguments, too, will be aired in this book. But un­ til all the issues are aired out in the open, geocentrists will just have to stick to Acts 24:14:
But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets. [Em­ phasis added.]
I should also explain a point of style in my writings. I do not capitalize second- and third-person referenees to God. By not capitalizing them 1run the risk of being accused of irreverence, for the practice of their capitalization is widely assumed reverential.

6 Chapter 1
Nevertheless, I do not follow that convention for the following rea­ sons: first, Scripture itself does not so do; second, capitalizing sec­ ond and third person references to God starts a trend that eventu­ ally transposes the honor due God to other things, potentially lead­ ing to pantheism. For example, writing “God’s House” spreads the honor due God alone to his house. Likewise, God’s Word (or the Word of God) properly refers to the Lord Jesus Christ as the sec­ ond person of the Trinity whereas God’s word is the Holy Scrip­ tures, consisting of the written words of God.
Lastly, a word about the figure naming convention used here. The numbering restarts with each chapter and within that chapter figures are referred to as Figure 1, Figure 2, etc. However, if the figure referred to is in another chapter, say Figure 2 in Chapter 20, for instance, then the reference will be to “Figure 20.2.”
Assumptions
The purpose of this book is to teach the churches that they erred greatly in the seventeenth century when they transferred the authority of Scripture to science when it comes to dealing with the physical realm. In order to fulfill that purpose, I must hold God to much stricter and higher standards than do modem theologians. To that end, I list the assumptions I labor under when it comes to handling the Holy Bible. I assume that Scripture was written by and preserved by an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God. There are certain properties a book inspired by such a God should exhibit:
1. Scripture must be free of internal contradictions. 2. Scripture must be free of all logical paradoxes such as the
liar’s paradox.
E.g., in every modem version Titus 1:12 suffers from the liar’s paradox when a Cretian says “Cretians are always liars.” The paradox arises as follows: Paul says the Cretian speaks the truth, but if Cretians always lie, then the speaker, as a Cretian, must be lying. But if he is lying, then Cretians must always tell the fruth and he, as a Cretian, must be telling the tmth and so on round and round.

Introduction 1
3. Scripture cannot have any historical errors. 4. Scripture cannot have any physical errors. 5. Scripture cannot contain any grammatical errors. 6. Scripture will always be written in a language especially
designed to survive the corruption of the words in general use. In effect, inspired Scripture is east in a sacred or theo­ logical language, easily learned by those who will bother to read it. As such, secular meanings of words should not be read back into the sacred text. 7. Scripture is not a product of evolution. By that I mean that there are no copyist or intentional errors in Scripture that are not immediately recognizable (e.g. typographic errors), nor are there any redaetions altering the words of God. 8. The inspiration that gave the original autographs survives in subsequent copies and in translation. If this rule is vio­ lated, God cannot hold man responsible for doubting his word and disobeying it. This assumption requires that the standard Scripture must always be deteetable at all times. Today, the standard Scripture, as proven by the fact that virtually every new version feels obligated to compare it­ self to it, is the Authorized Version. 9. When quoting a man, Scripture is only required to quote him accurately to maintain its inerrancy or infallibility. The content of such a quote, whether the truth or a lie, may thus violate the above rules without affecting the inerrancy of Scripture.
Only the Authorized Version avoids the paradox by saying “Cretians are alway liars.” Alway is the accusative case, which exempts the accuser from the accu­ sation.

Yea, hath God said...? — Satan, Genesis 3:1
THE IMPORTANCE OF GEOCENTRICITY
To hear tell, geocentrism—the ancient doctrine that the earth is fixed motionless at the center of the universe—died over four centuries ago in the face of an overwhelming avalanche of scien­ tific evidence and proof History, however, tells a different story. The “overwhelming” evidence was in favor of the geocentric the­ ory, not against it.
In 1542 Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish canon of the Roman Catholic Church, insisted that only the sun and not the earth was worthy to be at the center of the universe despite the clear teaching of Scripture to the contrary. Copernicus’ advocacy of Heliocen­ trism, as his model is called, was based entirely on Greek philoso­ phy. Despite the insistent efforts of vociferous and enthusiastic Copemican supporters such as Johannes Kepler and Galileo Gali­ lei, it took a hundred years for heliocentrism to become the domi­ nant worldview; and it did so with all scientific evidence favoring the best geocentric model and no evidence favoring Copernicus’ model. Throughout the entire seventeenth century, the evidence overwhelmingly favored the geocentric model and denied the Co­ pemican model. The modem claim that the heliocentric model overpowered the geocentric universe model with irrefutable evi­ dence and proof is a myth, the first of many associated with helio­ centrism.
The Copemican Revolution, as the shift from the geocentric to heliocentric universe is called, was not just a revolution in the field of astronomy, nor was it a revolution of good science overpower-

The Importance o f Geocentricity 9
ing bad science and superstition. The real revolution was against Holy Scripture. If the earth rotates on its axis then the author of Scripture, even the Holy Ghost (II Peter 1:21*), verbally inspired a falsehood in Joshua 10:13^ when he wrote that “the sun stood still.” Likewise, the Holy Ghost, when giving by inspiration the words, “He maketh his sun to rise...” in Matthew 5:45^ passed off another falsehood as the truth (John 14:17^). The reverberations of the Copemican Revolution still ring today, particularly in the realms of politics and theology; for without said revolution, there could be no higher criticism which assumes God is incapable of writing what he meant to say or meaning what he wrote. Without the Copemican Revolution there would be no Marxism in which the state replaces God. Nor could there be any evolutionism with its bigotry and racism and faith that man will eventually evolve to ultimately overpower God. After all, if God cannot be taken liter­ ally when he writes of the “rising of the sun,” then how can he be taken literally in writing of the “rising of the Son?” (Malachi 4:2 ) According to “science,” both are equally impossible.
Prior to heliocentrism there was geocentrism, the ancient be­ lief that the earth is located at rest in the center of the universe. Until well into the sixteenth century most people believed that the earth was immobile at the center of the universe; that was taken for granted to be both scriptural and natural. To question the immobil­ ity of the earth was to invite the charge of heresy. The earth was,
II Peter 1;21— For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men o f God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. ^ Joshua 10:13— And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day. ^Matthew 5:45— That ye may be the children o f your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. ^John 14:17— Even the Spirit o f truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. * But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun o f righteousness arise with heal­ ing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.

10 Chapter 2
after all, central in God’s attention, central to his affection, and central to the purpose of creation. It was to the earth that Jesus Christ came. It was on earth that he died on the cross for the sins of man; and it was in earth that he was resurrected that man may have eternal life. It is on earth where happen those things which “the angels desire to look into” (I Peter 1:12 ). How logical, then, the idea that the earth is nestled unmoving at the center of all crea­ tion?
But the rise of heliocentrism in the sixteenth century changed all that. Gradually the heliocentric belief became the dominant faith so that today, except for considerations under the aegis of relativity or Mach’s principle (two secular theories allowing the possibility of geocentricity because all appearances demand it), one is considered scientifically illiterate if one seriously questions heliocentrism at all. The truth is that modem science no longer believes the Copemican idea that the sun is at the center of the universe. Today’s consensus has it that there is no center to the universe or, rather, that every place in the universe, whether the center of a supercluster of galaxies or a dizzily spinning proton, looks as if it is neither moving nor rotating at the center of the uni­ verse. The modem view is more properly termed either as acentric (without center) or more correctly, pancentric (with its center eve­ rywhere) instead of heliocentric. Likewise, the modem view cor­ responding to geocentrism, which placed the earth at the geometric center of the universe, now places earth at the dynamic center (also called the center o f mass, the center o fgravity, the balancing point, the pivot point, and the barycenter) of the universe. As a result, the modem form of geocentrism is properly called Geocentricity, not geocentrism or geocentricism. Geocentricity is the theory that earth neither rotates on its axis daily nor orbits the sun annually but is the center on which the rest of the universe turns. Geocentricity is the assurance that the Bible can be taken literally, not only when
I Peter 1:12— Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into.

The Importance of Geocentricity 11
it tells us “how to go to heaven,” but also when it tells us “how the heavens go”; Galileo to the contrary.
Scholarly Opinions on the Significance of Geocentricity
That the Bible is overtly geocentric has been noted by believer and unbeliever alike. Augustus De Morgan, one of the foremost mathematicians of the nineteenth century, wrote about the immo­ bility of the earth as taught in the Bible:
The question of the earth’s motion was the single point in which orthodoxy came into real contact with science. Many students of physics were suspected of magic, many of atheism: but, stupid as the mistake may have been, it was bona fide the magic or the atheism, not the physics, which was assailed. In the astronomical case it was the very doctrine, as doctrine, in­ dependently of consequences, which was the corpus delicti: and this because it contradicted the Bible. And so it did; for the stability of the earth is as clearly assumed from one end of the Old Testament to the other as the solidity of iron. Those who take the Bible to be totidem verbis dictated by the God of Truth can refuse to believe it; and they make strange reasons. They undertake, a priori, to settle Divine intentions. The Holy Spirit did not mean to teach natural philosophy: this they know beforehand; or else they infer it from finding out that the earth does move, and the Bible says it does not. Of course, ignorance apart, every word is truth, or the writer did not mean truth. But this puts the whole book on its trial: for we can never find out what the writer meant, unless we otherwise find out what is true. Those who like may, of course, declare for an inspiration over which they are to be viceroys; but common sense will either accept the verbal meaning or deny verbal in­ spiration.’
Likewise, the twentieth-century atheistic philosopher, Ber­ trand Russell, recognized the crucial challenge which heliocen-

12 Chapter 2
trism presented to the Bible’s authority when he wrote of the Ten Commandments that their authority:
...rests upon the authority of the Bible, which can only be maintained intact if the Bible is accepted as a whole. When the Bible seems to say that the earth does not move, we must adhere to this statement in spite of the arguments of Galileo, since otherwise we shall be giving encouragement to murder­ ers and all other kinds of malefactors. Although few would now accept this argument, it cannot be regarded as absurd, nor should those who acted upon it be viewed with moral reproba­ tion.^
Several pages later, Russell writes about the demise of scrip­ tural geocentricity concomitant with the demise of the Bible’s au­ thority among Christians. He notes that:
...inconvenient Bible texts were interpreted allegorically or figuratively.^
And still later he credits the Copemican Revolution with the de­ mise of Christians themselves as authorities on matters scientific:
...in the period of time since Copernicus, whenever science and theology have disagreed, science has proved victorious."*
Besides philosophers and mathematicians, theologians also admit to the geocentric nature of the Holy Bible. Rabbi Louis Jacobs of London, for example, while writing of the scriptural model of the universe states, “the Biblical picture is clearly geo­ centric.”^ In rare moments of candor, even Evangelical theologi­ ans will reflect on the problem of reconciling the geocentric nature of the Bible with the heliocentrism of modem science:
To illustrate what we mean by unconvincing hermeneuti­ cal procedures, we need only recall the way many conserva-

The Importance o f Geocentricity 13
tives seek to harmonize the Bible with the Copemican view of the universe. When Copernicus first abandoned the geocentric model of the universe for a heliocentric one, the church was appalled. Church leaders appealed to Scripture, which com­ pares the sun to “a strong man running a race whose circuit is from one end of heaven to the other” (Psalm 19:4 and 5*) and which declares that the “world also is established that it cannot be moved” (Psalm 93:1^). From these and similar texts they conclude that the sun moves around the earth which remains fixed in its position. They were correct insofar as this is what the text of the Scripture says. Today, however, we can no longer accept this as a scientific description of what happens. Some conservatives, however, feel compelled to reconcile Scripture with reality. Normally they handle the problem by replying that the passages in the Psalms are poetry. But this hermeneutieal observation is more erudite than helpful, for poetry is as clear in its meaning as prose. “The world also is established that it cannot be moved” can hardly be a poetic way of saying that the earth is spinning on its axis and gyrat­ ing through space in a path determined by the orbit of the sun. The meaning which the older interpreters gave the text is no doubt the meaning the author intended. To admit as much is simply to apply the fundamental hermeneutical canon of the grammatical-historical method.^
From these several quotations it is evident just what is the cen­ tral issue in the heliocentric debate: at issue is the authority of the Holy Bible. Did God really write “true truth,” as Francis Schaeffer called it; or did God deceive for the sake of convenience so that his
Psalm 19:4-5— Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end o f the world. In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun, Which is as a bridegroom coming out o f his chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to mn a race. t Psalm 93:1— The LORD reigneth, he is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, wherewith he hath girded himself: the world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.

14 Chapter 2
words would not appear too cryptic to the ancient mind? However, this begs the question of why God would make it cryptic for us in­ stead of the ancients. Is the Bible clear in its teachings, or do we need scientific “experts” to advise us as to what “God really meant to say” but evidently did not have the wits to say properly, forth­ rightly, or plainly? And if God does write things that are not true in those passages which refer to the immobility of the earth, then how can man trust anything else God writes? How could we pos­ sibly know what God “meant” to say or what is true if he does not say what he means in the first place? Or is the heliocentric idea merely another version of Satan’s ploy to deceive Eve as recorded in Genesis 3:1, where the devil casts doubt upon the veracity of God’s word? And finally, is the evidence for heliocentrism really as overwhelming as the elementary textbooks make it seem? Sci­ ence historian Thomas Kuhn includes the geocentric model in “these matters” when he writes that:
In the case of textbooks, at least, there are even good reasons why, in these matters, they should be systematically mislead­ ing.^
Starting in the early nineteenth century and increasingly through the twentieth and into the twenty-first centuries, there was an explosion of knowledge, unprecedented in history, in the light of which geocentrism has returned in a new form called geocentricity. The key distinction between geocentricity and geo­ centrism is this: geocentrism was, as the suffix -ism relates, a divi­ sive idea; divisive in the sense that the model did not allow for a universe in which the parts were free to interact. From Aristotle and throughout the Dark Ages the geocentric model was a differentiated model, one in which the planets moved on crystalline spheres and where no astral body could leave its particular sphere and interact with its neighbors without shattering a sphere. Geo­ centricity, on the other hand, is an integrative model which ties the parts of the cosmos together into a holistic system. Thus, heliocen­ trism and pancentrism need additional hypotheses to explain cer-

The Importance o f Geocentricity’ 15
tain celestial and physical phenomena, hypotheses that are not needed in geocentricity. This aspect of geocentricity we shall examine in the latter chapters of the book.
Conclusion
So why is geocentricity an important topic to Bible believers, both Jews and Christians?
1. If it is taught in Scripture, it must be important since there are no insignificant or disposable doctrines in Scripture. If there were, in the very act of writing about them God would waste not only our time but also his own.
2. It was on the issue of geocentricity that science challenged Seripture, and by backing down in the absence of any evi­ dence—let alone proof—against the Holy Bible, believers crippled both the authority of Scripture as well as their own authority as keepers of the words of God in not only the eyes of the world, but even their own eyes. Geocentricity is still the only conflict between science and Scripture. Evolution is not science. That evolution is superstition and not scientific is confirmed by evolutionists’ frenetic cries to ban all contrary evidence from the classrooms of the world.
3. Because geocentricity cannot ignore the existence of the universe in its theories, it presents an integrated and far more comprehensive view of the universe.
4. Even though the lack of geocentrists among astronomers caused the evidence for the heliocentric view to predomi­ nate for about one hundred-fifty years, later measurements and observations forced a return to the geocentric view­ point. Unwilling to do that, secular science instead adopted the theory of relativity to keep the earth moving despite it­ self.
For a true Bible-believer, the first point should be enough. Nevertheless, we shall examine the issues in detail, starting with the assertion that geocentrists are throwbacks to believers in a flat earth.

The Bible is not a textbook on science. — Aurelius Augustine
THE BIBLE AND THE FLAT EARTH
The Bible is not a textbook on science. This slogan, so com­ monly quoted among the pancentric Christian intelligentsia, seems to have originated with Augustine of Hippo (A.D. 354-430). It is usually invoked as a magic incantation to handle an apparent conflict between Scripture and science. The invocation invariably serves as an excuse for why the Bible need not be taken literally on any particular scientific point. In other words, the saying is in­ voked to diminish the authority of Scripture in at least the scien­ tific realm. However, II Timothy 3:16 tells us that the Bible is authoritative in all that it touches upon, science included; so one must question the application of Augustine’s claim in those places where the Bible does make scientific pronouncements. By treating the Scripture as authoritative in science when it appertains to the first chapter of Genesis, creationists have argued quite well against evolutionists; but there are still questions that have systematically been avoided by Christian scientists over the last several centuries. Two of these are geocentricity and whether the Bible presents a flat earth. In this chapter we deal with the latter.
Historical Introduction
The flat-earth model was widely espoused by the ancients. The Hindus, for example, have a cosmology in which the earth is a flat
II Timothy 3:16—All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doc­ trine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.

The Bible and the Flat Earth 17

disk, placed on the baek of an elephant named Gaia which, in turn,

is standing on a giant turtle swimming in a vast cosmic ocean (Fig­

ure 1).

Even more ancient

than the Hindu flat

earth model are the

Egyptian

models.

The Egyptians be­

lieved the earth to be

flat and surrounded by

mountains over whieh

was stretched the naked

body of the goddess

Nut (Figure 6.3). We’ll

Figure 1; The Hindu Cosmology, by Jane Habermas

say more about that in Chapter 6.

Until the sixth eentury before Christ, the Greeks believed the

earth to be flat and shouldered by the giant. Atlas. Cracks in the

flat-earth facade appeared about the sixth century B.C. when a

Greek astronomer, Erastosthenes, noted that the shadow of the

earth is always eircular. An eclipse of the moon happens when the

moon passes through the shadow of the earth. Since the shadow is

always circular in shape, Erastosthenes concluded that the earth

must be a sphere (Figure 2).

What of the so-called church fathers? Did they all believe that

the earth is flat? Yes, some did. Cosmas Indicopleustes (lit. ex­

plorer of India), who lived in the first half of the sixth century, ad­

vocated a flat earth in his Christian Topography eirca A.D. 550

(Figure 3). But he was in a small minority. His flat-earth model

was opposed by John Philoponus (490-570), the originator of the

scientific method. The most renowned flat-earth advocate of all

time is Aurelius Augustine (354-430), who, in his City o f God, ar­

gues for a flat earth when he opposes belief in the antipodes.' The

antipode from where you are located right now is the spot on the

earth direetly opposite to your location that is, the place you would

break out of the earth if you were to dig straight down through the

18 Chapter 3
Figure 2: The Moon Passing Through the Earth's Shadow. Note the round­ ness o f the umbra projected on the moon.
center of the earth. The two locations, where you are and where your antipode is, are antipodes.
Among the Western church fathers, only Tertullian (c. 140- c. 230), Augustine, and Lactantius (c. 240- c. 320) adhered to a flat earth. Indian scholars knew the earth to be spherical, as did the sailors of Tarshish who had a three-year trading cycle. Three years is about how long it takes to circumnavigate the earth by sail on a trading mission. We read in II Chronicles 9:21 that ships of Tarshish visited Solomon every three years bringing gold, silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks. Although some theologians and geog­ raphers thought the earth was flat, sailors, merchants, and astrono­ mers knew it to be spherical. The Flat Earth Bible Fraud
Most modem scholars claim that the Bible advocates an earth that is flat, rectangular, and placed on several pillars. The pillars.

The Bible and the Flat Earth 19
in turn, are based on a foundation (Figure 4). The scholars reason that since this is how the ancients envisioned the earth, in writing the Bible they must have echoed the scientific dogmas of the time. It is not uncommon to read that in the Middle Ages people be­ lieved the earth to be flat and that those who opposed the idea were burned at the stake. It is even told that Christopher Columbus had difficulty getting support for his proposal to journey to the west to reach the Far East because the prevailing opinion was that the earth was flat. But history belies both that the Scripture teaches a flat earth and that the ancients believed the earth to be flat.

■

MU >■

A » » < • «■»»♦ J

Figure 3: The Map o f Cosmos Indicopleustes. It is patterned after the taber­ nacle. At right are the four rivers emanating from Paradise, the Euphrates,
Tigris, Ganges, and Nile.
Neither Columbus nor his contemporaries thought that the earth was flat. Whence, then, is the error to the contrary? Histori­ cally, it appears that the flat-earth fiction originated with Washing­ ton Irving (1783-1859) who introduced it on pages 117-130 of his 1828 book. The Life and Voyages o f Christopher Columbus. About the same time, the error was propagated in France by Antoine-Jean Letronne (1787-1848).^ In the 1820s and 1830s the flatearth story snowballed, reaching outrageous proportions by the late

20 Chapter 3
1800s when Darwin’s defenders delighted to use it to deride their unstudied Bible-believing opponents.^

.'A&r

O*
'W/.
%

Figure 4: Typical Modern Opinion Passed off as the Scriptural View.
The Form of the Earth In Scripture
The opinions of men are never final to the truth. We thus con­ sider what the Scripture itself has to say about the form of the earth.
Figure 4 is typical of the model presented as scriptural by modem theologians. Such illustrations have an air of authenticity but none occur prior to the late nineteenth century. A key piece of evidence belying the model is its absence therein of the founda­ tions of heaven and earth mentioned in Scripture.
Now a careful study reveals that a flat earth is not dictated by the strict wording of the Bible. On the contrary, the Bible was al-

The Bible and the Flat Earth 2 1
ready referring to the sphericity of the earth some 500 years before the Greeks first thought to question the flatness of the earth. The Bible’s model has a spherical earth, with regions of dry land corre­ sponding to continents, and pillars undergirding the earth. Since Genesis 1:10 defines the earth as the dry land, the pillars can be inferred to be the crystalline rock, commonly called the mantle. Furthermore, the Bible tells of an unspecified number of foundations to the earth which range from the roots of mountains, to the core of the earth, to the very foundation of foundations, the Lord Jesus Christ himself Some of the arguments given in this chapter in defense of the Bible’s view of a spherical earth are over four hundred years old, others are presented for the first time; but all belie the view that the biblical earth is flat; the view that is claimed by most of this world’s scholars.
By the time of the Middle Ages, scientific opinion was solidly for the spherical earth, although scholars in other fields— particularly Augustinian theologians—still had doubts. Even after America was discovered and Magellan had sailed around the earth, scholarly opinion was still divided on the issue of the shape of the earth; but proponents of the spherical earth were in the majority. Such was reported by the French academician and Christian scien­ tist, Lambert Daneau, who, in his 1578 book The Wonderfvll VVoorkmanship o f the World, defended the sphericity of the earth on the grounds of Scripture and geometry with these words:
...so that in these positions and kindes of places and dif­ ferences are found in the world, you may conclude that which you would, to wit, that the whole receite of this worlde is not sphericall and rounde.'^
Here the word “receite” is an old spelling of our modem word, “recite.” Daneau claims that despite both biblical and geometric arguments for a spherical earth, there was still no consensus among the people of his day.
Within 70 years after Daneau wrote his book, the Reformation Bible translations were completed throughout Europe. These translations, done by Greek and Hebrew scholars of unsurpassed

22 Chapter 3
capability, gave all people access to the Bible and also provided far stronger biblical support for the sphericity of the earth than the handful of passages used by Daneau and his contemporaries.
So just what does the Bible have to say about the earth’s shape? In order to find the answer to that question we need to look at the parts of the earth. The Bible lists the following: the founda­ tions o f the world and the earth', the pillars o f the earth', the cor­ ners o f the earth', and the ends o f the earth. We consider these in order.
The Foundations of the World
The Bible speaks of both the world and the earth as having foundations. The world is defined as the order of man in the earth (see Chapter 4). As such, references to foundations and pillars of the world cannot be held as very authoritative in determining the physical shape of the earth. The term earth, on the other hand, can refer to the whole earth, or merely to ground or soil, or to a land, or to a country (see Chapter 5). In order to arrive at a complete pic­ ture of the form of the earth as presented in Scripture all these meanings must be considered. Although the world-passages are weak, it behooves us to examine those verses that refer to the foundation of the world in order to make certain that they do not contribute to arguments about the shape of the earth.
In Scripture, we find three passages that speak of the founda­ tions of the world. Of the three, two are almost identical. Those two are found in II Samuel 22:16 and Psalm 18:15:
And the channels of the sea appeared, the foundations of the world were discovered, at the rebuking of the LORD, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils. (II Samuel 22:16)
Then the channels of waters were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered at thy rebuke, O LORD, at the blast of the breath of thy nostrils. (Psalm 18:15)

The Bible and the Flat Earth 23
Both passages indicate that the foundations of the world are now hidden but will be discovered at the time of the judgment.
The third reference to the foundations of the world is found in Psalm 24:1-2 and tells us just what these foundations are:
’The earth is the LORD’S, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.
For he hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.
Since world pertains to the order of mankind, and since water is absolutely essential to human life, there can be little argument about the truth of the statement that the world is founded upon the seas and not, as pictured by most scholars, founded upon rocky foundations like the foundations of a building. Floods are crucial for fertilizing the soil and for some plants, like rice, for instance. Ultimately the world is founded upon Jesus Christ, from whom streams the living water.
The Foundations of the Earth
When it comes to the foundations of the earth, there are more scriptures from which to draw. Many of these report that God laid the foundations of the earth; but each verse adds a little to that simple fact. Psalm 102:25 tells us that God laid the foundations “of old,” and Hebrews 1:10 echoes the thought that God laid the foundations of the earth “in the beginning.” Job 38:4 states that God laid the foundations of the earth and the sixth verse implies that the foundations are themselves fastened upon something else; Hebrews 1:3 names this “something else” as the Lord Jesus Christ who upholds “all things by the word of his power.” Proverbs 8:29 tells us that the earth’s foundations were appointed. Proverbs 3:19 reports that the earth was founded by wisdom, while Jeremiah 31:37 indicates that earth’s foundations are unsearchable. Micah 6:2 tells us that they are strong, so strong that the earth should never be removed (Psalm 104:5).

24 Chapter 3
In the light of these passages, three conclusions are readily ap­ parent about the foundations of the earth. First, the foundations themselves are fastened upon Christ, the sustainer of the universe. Second, the foundations are themselves located somewhere under the earth; and third, we are limited in what we can learn about them, for Jeremiah 31:37 states:
Thus saith the LORD; If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the LORD.
Of these three conclusions, the first is spiritually discerned, the second is obvious, and the third is scientifically verifiable.
Whenever there is an earthquake, shock waves are propagated throughout the interior of the earth. Seismologists use these waves to study the interior of the earth. But there is one area that the waves fail to penetrate, an area which cannot be studied. That area is the earth’s core, the very central part or “foundation” of the spherical earth. This is the thing of which the prophet Jeremiah spake. To further illustrate the unsearchability of the earth’s core, note that seismologists still argue whether the center of the earth is composed of molten iron or rock. No one knows for certain. And so, the biblical passages on the foundations of the earth stand as authoritative as ever.
The Pillars of the Earth
If the scriptural view of the earth is that of a spherical earth, what then of the “pillars of the earth?” The pillars are mentioned in three similar passages, Hannah’s prayer in I Samuel 2:8 being the first:
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory: for the pillars of the earth are the LORD’S, and he hath set the world upon them.

The Bible and the Flat Earth 25

Obviously this verse indi­

cates that the earth has pil­

lars and that the world

(that which pertains to

man) is set upon them, not

having any pillars of its

own. Note that this verse

does not require that the

earth be placed on the pil­

lars, only that the world is

“set” thereon. Later we

shall find this view to be

consistent with the other

two Scripture passages. It

does not seem to be the

case, as historians de

Figure 5: D evil’s Tower Provides an Ex- Santillanna and Von

ample o f Crystalline Pillars. Note two climbers at left.

Dechend argued in their book Hamlet’s Mill, that

the pillars of the earth are the two solstices and the two equinoxes.

(The solstices are the highest and lowest points at which the sun

appears in the sky, occurring on the first days of summer and win­

ter respectively; and the equinoxes are the times when the sun

crosses the equator, corresponding to the first days of autumn and

spring.)

Finally, there is one more Scripture reference to consider be­

fore concluding this study of the pillars of the earth. Job 26:7 will

modify any preconceived notions we may have about those pillars,

for it reads:

He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.

26 Chapter 3
A flat earth upon pillars and foundations, hanging upon noth­ ing, seems like a contradiction. One usually pictures the foundation to be the primary support for a structure, but here we see that in addition to the pillars and foundations underneath, the earth also hangs upon nothing.
That the pillars are under pressure is clear, for they support the surface of the earth (where the world is) according to Hannah’s song. If the earth is spherical in shape, then the earth’s pillars must be located between the earth’s surface and the core. In particular, the pillars of the earth could simply be radial crystalline rock which pervades the earth’s mantle.
Seismic studies reveal that there is a shell of crystalline rock inside the earth, namely, the mantle. Occasionally these crystalline forms can be found on the surface of the earth, brought up as lava. The crystals can easily be 15 feet in diameter. There are at least two examples of such rock in the continental United States: one is Pinnacles National Monument in California; and the other, more graphic example, is Devil’s Tower National Monument in Wyo­ ming (Figure 5). Such vertically-oriented crystals could make up the pillars of the earth. I admit this is sketchy, but we have very little solid knowledge of the interior of the earth (Figure 6).
The Corners and Ends of the Earth
If the foundations and pillars of the earth seem to be scientifi­ cally reasonable, then what of the four comers of the earth? Isn’t that proof of the Bible teaching that the earth is flat? Satellite re­ sults from the 1960s and ‘70s showed that the earth has four bulges. Some Christian apologists have taken these four bulges to be the four comers of the earth; but such is a reach, especially since the bulges are only a few yards above the mean shape of the earth. The problems encountered in understanding the comers of
To be precise, I am not proposing that Pinnacles and D evil’s Tower are the tops of pillars sticking out from earth’s mantle. I am proposing that the mantle is crystalline in structure and that those crystals may be packed and oriented the same way as these two examples o f re-crystallized lava.

The Bible and the Flat Earth 27
the earth only arise if one ignores the dictionary definition of the word corner. The Oxford English Dictionary defines “comer” to mean:
An extremity or end of the earth; a region, quarter; a direction or quarter from which the wind blows.
Open Firmament (Atmosphere)
Earth
Figure 6: The Form oj the Earth According to Scripture
The word corner comes from a Latin root cornu, meaning “horn.” We see this in English words such as “comet,” “com,” and “cornu­ copia.” Hence the four comers of the earth can be interpreted as referring to the four cardinal directions—north, south, east, and west. Additionally, the “four comers of the earth” can also be in­ terpreted as four “horns” of the earth. One obvious example of such a “horn” is Cape Horn, the southernmost tip of South Amer-

28 Chapter 3
ica. Thus the phrase “four comers of the earth” does not require a flat, rectangular earth.
Besides the “four comers of the earth,” the Bible also men­ tions “the ends of the earth.” For the ends of the earth, the above dictionary definition contains the resolution within it; for by saying the “ends of the earth” we can simply mean the “extremities of the earth” such as its beginning and its end in time or any antipodes.
Implicit in the above resolutions for both the ends of the earth and the comers of the earth is the assumption that the word earth refers to the land mass, country, or continents, not necessarily the globe. Is this scripturally consistent?
What Is the Earth?
We now come to one of the cmcial arguments for the spheric­ ity of the earth as presented in the Bible. When people claim the Bible teaches that the earth is flat, they take it for granted that every time the Bible uses the word “earth,” it means the entire globe; but such is rarely the case. Usually when the Bible uses the word “earth,” it means a particular land or country. For example, compare Exodus 10:15:
For [the locusts] covered the face of the whole earth, so that the land was darkened; ... and there remained not any green thing in the trees, or in the herbs of the field, through all the land of Egypt [emphasis added]
with verses 12 through 14:
12 And the LORD said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand over the land o f Egypt for the locusts, that they may come up upon the land o f Egypt, and eat every herb of the land, even all that the hail hath left. 13 And Moses stretched forth his rod over the land o f Egypt....
And the locusts went up over all the land o f Egypt [empha­ sis added].

The Bible and the Flat Earth 29
Since the word “earth” can be synonymous with land, country, or nation, the “ends of the earth” refer to the points of land most distant from some central point. For the Bible, this central point is the land of Israel. By examining a globe, the reader can satisfy himself that a great circle, passing through Jerusalem and the north and south poles, cuts the Pacific Ocean in half and leaves four con­ tinental “eomers” or “ends,” namely the Chukchi Peninsula of the former Soviet Union (opposite the Bering Straits of Alaska), Alaska, the southeastern tip of Australia, and Cape Horn of South America. These four geographieal loeations, as much as any other proposal, can account for the four eomers of the earth as the four landmasses most distant from Israel. In the light of such argument, we cannot claim that the Bible presents the earth as a four-cornered square.
This line of argument is supported by Scripture itself, for the first definition of “earth” occurs in Genesis 1:10 where we are told that God calls the “dry land. Earth.”
The Circle of the Earth
There are some passages in the Scripture which provide more direct evidence that Scripture espouses a round earth instead of a flat earth. The most famous of the Bible verses supporting a spherical earth is Isaiah 40:22 where it says of God that:
It is he that sitteth upon the circle o f the earth, and the in­ habitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in.... [emphasis added.]
The fact that this verse speaks of the “circle of the earth” can mean one of three things: first, the earth is not a flat square but a flat cir­ cle; second, the earth is shaped in a way that is spheroidal but has a square cross-section somewhere, at the equator for instance; and
Genesis 1:10— And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together o f the waters called he Seas; and God saw that it was good.

30 Chapter 3
third, the earth is spherical in shape. During the Renaissance, this verse was seen as the key biblical support for a spherical earth.
Isaiah 40:22 is not the only verse which speaks of the circle as descriptive of the shape of the earth. Proverbs 8:27 reads:
When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth...
The word “compass” can mean a circular enclosure, or it can mean a spherical envelope. Since the verse speaks of the seas which are an extended area covering about three-quarters of the surface of the earth, the spherical enclosure for “compass” is a better inter­ pretation than a circular enclosure.
By itself, the evidence for the sphericity of the earth in Isaiah 40:22 and Proverbs 8:27 is still only circumstantial. But when we combine those passages with the ones about the ends and comers of the earth, then there is a stronger case; to wit, if what the schol­ ars advocate is tme, that the Bible teaches that the earth is a flat rectangle, then how can one reconcile that with the aforementioned verses which speak of the circle and compass of the earth? Even the advocates of the flat earth have been forced by Isaiah 40:22 and Proverbs 8:27 to allow that the earth might be a circle. But if that is tme, then what of the four comers of the earth argument? A cir­ cle has no comers, anymore than does a sphere. So even the flatearth advocates admit that the four comers of the earth are the four cardinal directions: north, east, west, and south.
In the Twinkling of an Eye
If nothing else, the verses looked at heretofore serve to il­ lustrate that a spherical earth is not incompatible with the Bible. But there are two passages which are stronger still in their support that Scripture promotes a spherical earth. The first is Luke 17:3136 which reads as follows:

The Bible and the Flat Earth 31
31 In that day, he which shall be upon the housetop, and his stuff in the house, let him not come down to take it away: and he that is in the field, let him likewise not return back. 32 Remember Lot’s wife. 33 Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it; and who­ soever shall lose his life shall preserve it.
I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. 35 Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
What do these verses have to do with the shape of the earth? Simply this: they speak of day (verse 31) and night (verse 34) as occurring simultaneously. The activities are listed in the context of one or two global events which, depending on one’s dispensational view may be the rapture, which Paul says occurs in the “twinkling of an eye” (1 Corinthians 15:52), or the first of the sickle harvests of Revelation 14. The simplest explanation for this simultaneity of day and night is a spherical earth.
Now Bob Schadewald (1943-2000) criticized me for using Luke 17:31-36, saying that: “the modem (though not the ancient) flat-earth model has day and night occurring simultaneously at dif­ ferent points on earth.”^ It is tme that one can always postulate a curved-space geometry for light rays which would have day and night occurring simultaneously on a flat earth, and this is indeed advocated by today’s most sophisticated flat-earth proponents, but it misses the point. (Such geometrical arguments make it impossi­ ble to prove or disprove the flat-earth model.) The context of my argument is whether the Bible teaches a flat earth and I make my point against the flat-earth models of the times when Scripture was written. When Luke penned Luke 17:31-36, flat-earth advocates were still advocating Schadewald’s “ancienf’ flat-earth models, where the sun went under the earth, or behind a mountain at the edge of the earth, or returned to its rising point by journeying in a

32 Chapter 3
tunnel through the earth. If, as Schadewald assumed, the Bible was written by men, then it is clear that Luke could not have had the modem curved-space flat-earth view in mind when he wrote the passage; and so my argument against Bob’s premises stands.
The second of the strong passages is Acts 1:8 where Jesus commissions his disciples to be witnesses “unto the uttermost part of the earth.” Note here that the word “part” is singular. A flat earth, either a circle or a rectangle with four comers, should be in­ dicated by “uttermost parts” (plural); but a spherical earth would have only one uttermost part, namely, its opposite side or antipo­ des, even as Jesus said in Acts 1:8. The case for a spherical earth in the Bible is thus made.
The Flood and the Flat Earth
It was Prof James Hanson who first pointed out to me that Noah’s year-long flood requires a spherical earth. Here is why that is the case.
Consider the Hindu model in Figure 1. Clearly the waters would have fallen off the edge of the earth and could not have cov­ ered the highest mountains by fifteen cubits, as stated in Genesis 7:20. Barring a miracle, the waters would have drained off the earth too quickly, taking the ark with it. Genesis 7:24 says that the water remained 150 days (about five months) on the earth before it began to drain. Remember that the common flat-earth story is that ancient sailors, up to the time of Columbus were afraid of being swept over the edge of the earth by the waters spilling over the edge. Clearly, that belief is not consistent with the biblical account of the flood.
In Figure 4, which, in part, reflects the Egyptian idea of the flat earth, the earth is surrounded by a ring of mountains. In that case, the waters would have been fifteen cubits higher than the mountains at the edge of the earth. The waters would overflow the mountains for the next five months and would have eroded the mountains at the world’s edge. Moses was thus not influenced by

The Bible and the Flat Earth 33
his Egyptian teachings when God gave him by inspiration the words to write of the flood account.
Figure 7: Flammarion's 1888 Woodcut. It depicts a pilgrim who has reached the edge o f the flat earth, portraying the poplar nineteenth century view of the flat earth.
Conclusion The Holy Bible teaches that the earth is spherical in shape;
that there are pillars which undergird the earth which we propose are the crystalline rock of the mantle; that there are an unspecified number of foundations which range in size all the way from the foundations of the hills and mountains (called roots in modem sci­ ence) to the unsearchable core of the earth and down to the very foundation which is the Lord Jesus Christ himself This is the view of the earth presented in Scripture.

34 Chapter 3
A key argument for the flat-earth Bible hinges on the flat earth advocate’s assumption that when Scripture uses the word “earth,” it always means the entire globe. However, “earth” in the Bible, can also refer to a country, soil, or land—a limited area— as at­ tested to by the fact that it needs the word “all” in front of it to mean more than that. Furthermore, God gives the primary defini­ tion of earth as dry land, not the globe. Even the account of the flood given in Genesis 7 and 8 is incompatible with the flat earth models, even with today’s flat earth models. According to Scrip­ ture, the earth is a sphere.
What, then, of those who insist that the Bible does teach a flat earth? Those Bible critics simply have not studied the matter deeply enough. Knowing much about the Bible, they know little o f the Bible, and we are justified in viewing with due skepticism any man who uncritically prefaces his remarks with: “The Bible is not a textbook on science.”

Wherefore, if meat make my brother to of­ fend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest 1 make my brother to offend.
— I Corinthians 8; 13
MOTIONS OF THE WORLD
The Holy Bible makes a consistent and important distinction between the world and the earth. It is crucial that this distinc­ tion be understood in any discussion involving earth and world. Literally, the word world comes from two Germanic roots: wer, meaning “man,” and aid, meaning “age.” In Scripture the first oc­ currence of “world” is found in 1 Samuel 2:8 where, in verses 810, we read:
^ He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beg­ gar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory: for the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s, and he hath set the world upon them. ^ He will keep the feet of his saints, and the wicked shall be si­ lent in darkness; for by strength shall no man prevail.
The adversaries of the LORD shall be broken to pieces; out of heaven shall he thunder upon them: the LORD shall judge the ends of the earth; and he shall give strength unto his king, and exalt the horn of his anointed.
Verse 9 teaches us that the world is the strength of man and that it will be ruled by the Lord Jesus Christ (v. 10). Compare Isaiah

36 Chapter 4
24:4* where world is identified with the haughty people of the earth.
Job 37:12 best illustrates the difference between “earth” and “world” when it states:
And [God’s bright cloud] is turned round about by his coun­ sels: that [God’s clouds] may do whatsoever he commandeth them upon the face of the world in the earth.
The clause “upon the face of the world in the earth” indicates that the earth and the world are coupled together so that if the world does not move, then neither does the earth does move and vice versa. So we must look at the moving and fixed-world passages to see if they are consistent with the motions ascribed to the earth in the Bible.
Scripture’s references to the immobility of the world can be broken up into two groups: the first group is those that refer to the world to come, while the second group refers to this present world. That these two worlds are not one and the same is clearly presented in Matthew 12:32 where Jesus rebukes those who blaspheme against the Holy Ghost with the words:
...it shall not be forgiven...neither in this world, neither in the world to come.
It is the latter world that is sometimes referred to as the “world without end” in places such as Isaiah 45:17 and Ephesians 3:21. When it comes to this present world, there are only two references in the entire Bible describing its motion or lack thereof: Psalm 93:1 and I Corinthians 8:13.
Isaiah 24:4— The earth moumeth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish.

Motions o f the World 'il
Immobility of the Present World —Psalm 93:1
The first of the two references to the stability of this present world occurs in Psalm 93:1, which reads in part:
. . . the world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.
The word stablished may sound strange to the modem ear, but it communicates a very subtle point which, though present in the Hebrew, is lacking in all modem versions which favor the word “establish” instead. Stablish means to stabilize; establish means to set up. The rendering in the King James Bible reflects God’s con­ tinuing, stabilizing influence on this present world. This makes a lot of sense considering that the world is founded upon waters (Psalm 24:1-2). To use the English word “established” in this verse would allow one to draw the erroneous conclusion that God “set up” the present evil world system and now lets it ran down on its own. Except for Jehovah, the gods of all other faiths have left the world to the whims of fate. In contrast, the use of the word stablish indicates that Jehovah is actively keeping the world from the destabilizing effects of evil. As if to underscore that theme, the next verse of Psalm 93:2 interjects God’s throne into the picture:
Thy throne is established of old: thou art from everlasting.
It is from that throne that God will judge (Revelation 20:1 T). We shall have more to say on the matter in chapter 12 where we con­ sider the earth as footstool to the throne of God.
Since Psalm 93:1 says that the world is stablished that it can­ not be moved, it weakly follows that the earth on which the world is stablished is not moving either. However, that argument is not conclusive. If this were the strongest verse for the stationary earth, there would be no geocentricity. Because of its weakness, geocen-
* Revelation 20:11— And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.

38 Chapter 4
tricity’s critics in the creationist community have presented Psalm 93:1 as a straw man by pretending that this is the key scripture for geocentricity and then knocking it down.^ We shall examine the arguments of Creationists against geocentrists in Chapter 39.
Despite the verse’s weak support for the geocentric model, it was considered a significant support for geocentrism during the Copemican Revolution. As a result, some heliocentric apologists have felt the need to insert heliocentrism into the verse. Some have postulated that what the verse is really saying is that the earth neither can be deflected out of its orbit around the sun nor be per­ turbed in its orbit. They maintain that what God “really means” is that the orbit of the earth is stable rather than that the world is stablished. But is God really such a careless grammarian? If that is what God really meant to say, he could have done so simply by changing the wording. For instance, God could have written “the path of the world is stablished that it cannot be moved.” Further­ more, proper grammar would have required that God use such words as “deflected” or “perturbed” instead of “moved” if, indeed, the passage is intended to refer to the earth’s motion through space.
Heliocentrists have two problems with their interpretations. First, heliocentrists confuse the world with the earth; and second, they have violated their own heliocentric physics. Consider: the interpretation brought to bear is that the earth cannot be deflected in its orbit. But every astronomy student knows that the planets are constantly being deflected since they are subject to the gravita­ tional influences of all of the other planets. So heliocentrically speaking, the earth is being deflected in its orbit. (In all geocentric theories the earth is not a planet.) Heliocentrically, even earth’s very orbit is deflected, which deflection is called the perihelion precession. There is then no way that the Bible’s presentation can fit the heliocentric mold.
It is informative to look at some of the interpretations of Psalm 93:1 as conceived by various revisionists. Kenneth Taylor, for ex­ ample, in his Living Bible (which Taylor claims is not a Bible yet he titled it a Bible anyhow), goes so far as to equate the “establish­ ing” of the world with the “establishing” of God’s throne in Psalm

Motions o f the World 39
93:2 and promptly declares that the world is God’s throne. This is not only bad translating but bad exegesis and logic as well. Isaiah 66:1 clearly teaches that the earth is God’s footstool, not his throne; Psalm 11:4 places God’s throne in heaven and not in earth.
Sometimes the revisionists’ attempts around the implicit geocentricity of the passage humorously confound them. De Witt, in his Praise Songs o f Israel renders Psalm 93:1 as:
So the world standeth fast; it cannot be overthrown.
Changing “cannot be moved” to “cannot be overthrown” certainly does remove the stationary world overtones of the verse, but notice that “stablished” has been changed to “standeth fast” which rein­ troduces the stationary world sense of the passage.
R. K. Harrison, in his Psalms for Today, has decided that the word “world” is not proper English because of the geostasis inher­ ent in the passage. Instead of what is properly translated as “world,” he opts for a more obscure and archaic meaning for “world,” namely, “universe.” If “universe” were actually meant here instead of “world” then this would be the only such occur­ rence in Scripture. To assume this on the say-so of heliocentrists is sheer folly. Harrison renders the verse as:
The universe has been established immovably.
So we see that attempts to circumvent the geocentric implica­ tions inherent in Psalm 93:1-2 have proven to be weak, contradic­ tory, and occasionally comical.
Immobility of the Present World —I Corinthians 8:13
The second of the two passages which speak of the lack of motion on the part of the present world is I Corinthians 8:13:

40 Chapter 4
Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to of­ fend.
Since only the Authorized Version renders this verse in a sta­ tionary-world context, some will doubtless object that this is just bad translating on the part of the King James translating commit­ tee. But the issue is much deeper than simply bad translation. Psalm 12:6-7, in all Reformation translations, as well as the old Hebrew lexicons, indicates that Scripture can be inerrantly trans­ lated and preserved into every language after proper refinement of that language. Only the language of the King James Version is such a refined language, a sacred English language independent of colloquial and literal English. No other tongue underwent such refinement as to extract from it a sacred form of that language. Thus all modem versions, as well as the Reformation translations, read “forever” instead of “while the world standeth” in 1 Corinthians 8:13. Despite this, the underlying Greek idiom is phrased exactly as we find it in the Authorized Version. Thus the Authorized Version’s rendering is consistent with the translators’ resolve to use the same English wording for each Greek wording wherever the context allows.
In summary, then, there are no passages which indicate any motion for this present world; and two verses. Psalm 93:1 and 1 Corinthians 8:13, expressly deny any motion is partaken of by this current world.
Psalm 12:6-7— “The words o f the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace o f earth, purified seven times. ’ Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.” In conformance to the revi­ sion o f Scripture-based word meanings in the mid-eighteenth century, this pas­ sage is now said to refer to the preservation o f people instead o f words. For a defense o f the A.V. reading see: Thomas M. Strouse, 2007. “The Permanent Preservation o f God’s Words, Psalm 12:6, 7,” in Thou Shalt Keep Them, Kent Brandenburg, ed. (El Sobrante, CA: Pillar and Ground Publishing), pp. 29-33.

Motions o f the World 41
Steadfastness of the World to Come
If no motion is experienced by this present world, then cer­ tainly none should be experienced in the perfect world to come. Here, too, we find only two verses with reference to the new world’s motion. The two are I Chronicles 16:30 and Psalm 96:10. I Chronicles 16:30 reads:
Fear before him, all the earth: the world also shall be stable, that it be not moved.
The word “shall” here indicates the future tense so that, by it­ self, the verse cannot be invoked to indicate that the present world is immobile. But it does teach that the world to come will be sta­ ble and unmoving.
Now, heliocentrists say that the verse refers to the orbit of the new earth; but the same arguments as were presented against that interpretation of Psalm 93:1 can be invoked against the heliocen­ tric interpretation here. To indicate heliocentrism, the Masoretic text and all the translations should have used “deflected” or “per­ turbed” instead of “moved.” Significantly, most heliocentrists to­ tally miss that this verse is in the future tense. Heliocentrists attack the verse’s validity on the erroneous assumption that the present world is here claimed to be immovable.
Psalm 96:10, the second passage about the immobility of the world to come, reads:
Say among the heathen, that the LORD reigneth: the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved: he shall judge the people righteously.
This verse is strongly reminiscent of Psalm 93:1. Note that Psalm 96:10 uses the word established, whereas Psalm 93:1 uses the word “stablished. ” In the light of what we learned above about the distinction between these two words, the use of established here reveals that the world to come will be set up by the LORD in right­ eousness in such a way that the new world will not need continu-

42 Chapter 4
ous stabilization by God. In other words, it will be a righteous world. This conclusion, too, is absolutely scriptural.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the meaning of the Hebrew word translated in the Authorized Version as “world,” tebel, is always associated with mankind and is never associated with the universe or firmament. In Proverbs 8:31, tebel is translated as the “habitable part of his earth;” thus the definition of world as the order of man upon the face of the earth is as strong in Hebrew as in English. In the New Testament the nature of the world is laid out in I John 2:15-17, where it is identified as humanism with its gnosticism. There is not one single passage in the entire 66 books of the Bible which would lead one to conclude that the world is now or ever will be moving. Instead, we found one reference which directly indicates that this present world is not moving, and two verses which say that the world to come will not move either. Attempts to reconcile these verses with modem heliocentrism make God out to be a poor grammarian and make the reconcilers out to be the clairvoyants of what God actually meant to say but did not have the smarts or in­ tegrity to say correctly in the first place.

Sanctify them through thy truth; thy word is truth.
— John 17:17
MOTIONS OF THE EARTH
Like the biblical passages which deal with the motions of the world, the passages which refer to the motions of the earth can be divided into two categories. But, unlike the “world” passages, there are no “moving earth” references about the “new earth.” In­ stead, the earth passages can be split into those which pertain to the earth as it is now and those which describe the condition of the earth at the time ofjudgment.
Motions of this Present Earth —Psalm 104:5
The most famous and yet among the weakest of all geostatic passages is Psalm 104:5, which states that God:
...laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be re­ moved for ever.
Heliocentrists have assailed this verse from several different an­ gles; yet strangely, none seem ever to have correctly read the verse. Psalm 104:5 is conditional, it is not absolute; for we see the conditional “should” which need not reflect the way things are. Having missed that point, heliocentrists have charged that the words “laid the foundations” are improperly translated from the Hebrew; or they claim that the word “removed” is not correct; or they dismiss the verse as mere poetry, as if poetry never conveys literal truth. One of these charges was addressed in the first chap­ ter. The long quote from De Morgan lucidly presents the logical

44 Chapter 5
flaw in the “phenomenological poetry” argument—every word is true, whether poetry or prose, or the God of Truth could not have written it. With this concurs the chapter quote.
What of the first of the charges, the one about the correctness of the “laid the foundations” translation? The critics prefer “set the earth on its foundations.” But this does not in the least affect the implicit geocentricity of the verse. Instead, such an argument in­ troduces an uncertainty about just who “laid the foundations” if God only “set” the earth upon them. As far as the translation is concerned, the correct translation is “laid the foundations” even as we find it in the Authorized Version.
In looking at the second of the arguments, the status of the word “removed,” it is advisable to consult a dictionary. In previ­ ous chapters we have noted several cases where so-called archaic or “difficult” words have revealed very subtle shades of meaning, shades which are generally lost on Bible critics. The word “removed” affords us another example. “Removed” means “to shift out of a designated place.” “Move,” on the other hand, means to change position. Thus “removed” indicates that the earth is lo­ cated in a place which is special to it: a place especially prepared for it, a home, in other words. In fact, the British still use the word “remove” when a family moves from one home to another. This subtle overtone is also present in the Hebrew and so is exactly translated by the use of the word “remove.” Hence there is no problem with the English translation of Psalm 104:5.
For Psalm 104:5, too, it has been proposed that the verse really refers to the orbit of the earth, allegedly indicating that the orbit is stable and that the earth shall not be “removed” or “moved” out of it. This raises the same objections that we met in Chapter 4 where that proposal was applied to Psalm 93:1 (pg. 37). Again, God should have written “deflected” or “perturbed from its course” instead of “removed,” for according to modem astronomy the earth is continually being perturbed in its orbit by the gravitational pull of all the other bodies in the solar system. The proposal that the verse refers to the orbit of the earth does not at all bring the text into “conformity” with modem science. There is simply no helio-

Motions o f the Earth 45
centric view which is compatible with any of the various attempts around this passage, let alone with the literal truth of it.
Some of the Reformation translations are even stronger in the geostatic impact of this verse than is the Authorized Bible. The Dutch Statenhijhel, for example, reads, “totter” instead of “re­ moved.” Some modem versions, such as the NASV, also use “tot­ ter”; but in so doing the heliocentrists strongly bring themselves into direct conflict with modem astronomy because, according to astronomy, the earth is perpetually tottering on its axis. One totter­ ing phenomenon is known as the precession o f the equinoxes. An­ other example of a tottering earth is the Chandler wobble. The precession of the equinoxes is exactly akin to the tottering of a top or gyroscope. (In the geocentric case the tottering is ascribed to the heavens, not to the earth; but we shall defer such coverage until our consideration of the scientific evidence.) No matter what the heliocentrist tries, there seems to be no way around the conclusion that the verse is geostatic as long as heliocentrism’s apologists ne­ glect the conditionality of the verse.
Psalm 104:5 is of such great historical importance in the de­ bate between heliocentrism and geocentricity that private inter­ pretations and attempts at phenomenalization abound. Let us ex­ amine just a few of these as representative of all. We start with de Witt who, in his Praise Songs o f Israel presents:
.. that it should not be overthrown for ever.
Verkuyl, in his Modern Language, the New Berkeley Version in modem English, (ML) agrees, rendering it as:
... so that it should never be overthrown.
Taylor’s Living Bible (LB) gives the verse as:
... that it should never fall apart.

46 Chapter 5
The New King James (NKJV) trashes the finer points of the verse with its rendition of:
... so that it should not be moved for ever.
Likewise, the NIV states that;
.. .it can never be moved.
Finally, the Revised Standard Version (RSV) offers us:
... so that it should never be shaken.
Quickly let us note that contrary to the RSV, the earth does “shake” during an earthquake; and despite the LB, it will “fall apart” at the end time. We could go on and on and round and round with this; but as was noted, the heliocentrist has completely missed the one “out” afforded him, namely, the “should.”
Despite the long, hot debate about Psalm 104:5, most of it has been in vain. The resolution of the text does not hinge upon whether or not the earth be “moved” or “removed.” Nor does it hinge on whether or not it is the earth that is referred to in this verse or else its orbit around the sun. The simple fact is that the verse is conditional. Despite the centuries of arguing, the verse neither proves nor disproves geocentricity. All Psalm 104:5 says is that God “...laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be removed for ever.” The word should is a conditional word, unlike the word shall which has a sense of permanence that should does hot have. If any inference must be drawn, however, it is clear that the inference is geocentric.
The Abiding Earth
There are two other verses in Scripture, that indicate the im­ mobility of the earth. The first of these is Psalm 119:90 which states that:

Motions o f the Earth 47
Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth.
The second such passage is found in Ecclesiastes 1:4:
One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever.
Both of these verses use the word “abide,” a word which in Eng­ lish is not particularly strong in indicating a stationary earth. His­ torically, however, both verses have been held to support geocentricity. Interestingly, most of this has been done by Jewish schol­ ars rather than Christian scholars. This is because the geocentric implication of these verses is much stronger in Hebrew than in English. Note that in both Hebrew and English the word “abide” has in it not only the sense of waiting, but also a sense of dwelling, which is consistent with the earlier discussion about the word “re­ moved” in Psalm 104:5.
From all the passages of Scripture to which we have turned thus far no strong case can be built in support of geocentricity; but there is certainly no support for heliocentrism there either. In con­ trast, there is a set of Bible passages which do express definite mo­ tion on the part of the earth. These verses all refer to the earth in the context of the judgment. Although the verses afford the earth some motion, they do not at all help the cause of heliocentrism.
The Moving Earth
We now examine the passages which refer to motions on the part of the earth. The first occurs in Job 9:6 which states that God:
...shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble.
The second. Psalm 99:1, speaks likewise:

48 Chapter 5
The LORD reigneth; let the people tremble: he sitteth between the cherubims; let the earth be moved.
Isaiah 13:13 eontributes:
Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the LOPUD of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger.
Finally, Isaiah 24:19-20 is even broader:
The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dis­ solved, the earth is moved exceedingly.
The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it; and it shall fall, and not rise again.
Implicit in several of these verses is the notion that this present earth has a place, not a path. “Place” is hardly a fitting terminol­ ogy for a moving earth in this context. Again, if a heliocentric context had been intended then would God not have better used such words as “course” or “orbif ’ instead of “place”? Such word­ ing is not mystical or obscure and is entirely consistent with helio­ centrism. If the earth is to be shaken out of its place at the judg­ ment, then at that time the earth definitely will have motion. This concept of a motion for the earth at the judgment is entirely consis­ tent with the rest of Scripture and with all judgment passages which refer to the earth; it is only superficially inconsistent with verses such as Psalm 104:5 where the disallowance of motion is merely conditional.
Note that in Isaiah 13:13 the use of the word “remove” is fan­ tastically consistent on the part of the Authorized Bible. As was noted earlier in this chapter. Psalm 104:5 teaches that the earth “should not be removed"-, and we saw that the word “remove” has implicit in it the sense of the earth having a special place, a home of its own. The word “move” has no sueh significance, yet here, in

Motions o f the Earth 49
this verse, the earth’s place is again in evidence. There is no con­ tradiction between the earth’s being removed, as per this passage, and the statement that it should never be removed in Psalm 104:5, because the latter is conditional. The Bible teaches that it is man’s sin which causes the conditions to change so that the earth will ul­ timately be removed even though it was founded so that it should never be removed.
Psalm 99:1 does not say that the earth is now moving; it only says "'let the earth be moved.” It indicates the removal of some­ thing that is presently hindering the earth from moving. So it is that the verse cannot refer to changes in the course of the earth through space. It presents an earth that is presently immobile. (Strangely, if taken out of context this is the only verse in the Bible where one might remotely conclude that the earth is currently al­ lowed to move; but heliocentrists fail to pick up on it, choosing instead to alter the wording to read: “quiver,” “shake,” or “quake” instead of “move.”)
As far as Isaiah 24:19-20 are concerned, note the presence of the word “removed” in the immediate context of a dwelling (cot­ tage). Remember, too, that the world, not the earth, is said to be immovable in Psalm 93:1. We see the fulfillment of this thought in Revelation 20:11 where it says of the earth:
And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.
The first heaven and the first earth* are replaced by a new heaven and a new earth. The transfer of the inhabitants amounts to a removal.
We might expect that if the earth is to move at the end times, that there might be some reference to the foundations of the earth
* So referred to in Revelation 21:1, “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away....” Note that this con­ tradicts those who believe in a pre-Adamic earth, those who insist that this pre­ sent earth is the second earth.

50 Chapter 5
to emphasize the fact of that motion. Psalm 82:5 does give us such a reference when it states that the wicked:
know not, neither will they understand; they walk on in dark­ ness: all the foundations of the earth are out of course.
The context of this passage, too, refers to the final judgment; for the Psalm begins with:
God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the gods...
and it ends with:
Arise, O God, judge the earth: for thou shalt inherit all nations.
But what of Psalm 82:5’s use of the phrase “out of course” with reference to the foundations? Does this not indicate that the present earth has a course and is moving? May we not conclude this even though the verse refers to the judgment? Does this not contradict the other verses which indicate that the earth is not mov­ ing? We might indeed be able to draw this conclusion if it were not for the simple fact that this verse does not speak of the earth being out of course but instead speaks of the foundations o f the earth being out of course.
When it comes to the earth’s foundations, we need only con­ sider two: the underlying foundation, which is the Lord Jesus Christ himself, and the core of the earth. The context of the Psalm is the judgment. Christ came to earth to atone for the sins of man and thus to enable the salvation of anyone and everyone who would believe his sacrifice to be both necessary and sufficient. On those who do so falls none of the last judgment. Having the sin of the entire world imputed to him would most certainly be “out of course” for the sinless Jesus. Furthermore, in considering the na­ ture of the earth’s core, which is one of its “foundations,” it is noted that there are fluid motions in the core of the earth. These

Motions o f the Earth 51
motions maintain, it is believed, the magnetic field of the earth. Major changes in the flows within the core of the earth can have serious consequences.
Technically, for life to persist, earth’s magnetic field should be relatively strong. There are several reasons for this, but the most important is that the magnetic field of the earth deflects both the solar wind and cosmic rays. Both bombard the earth with highenergy particles akin to radioactivity. Without the magnetic field of the earth, the incidence of cancer is expected to rise dramati­ cally. The earth’s magnetic field is decaying at a rate that indicates it shall vanish in one or two thousand years. This, too, when ap­ plied to the earth’s core, could be viewed as a foundation “out of course.”
Historically, no heliocentrist has ever gone on record favoring Psalm 82:5 as proof for a moving earth; and there is good reason for this. No argument on behalf of a moving earth can solidly be based upon this verse. The context is all too clearly that of the last judgment, just as is the case for all Bible references to a moving earth.
Does Move Mean Move?
One could ask the question of whether the Hebrew word trans­ lated “move” actually means move in English. Of course it does, and the interested reader is referred to Appendix A for the details.
Conclusion
The end of the matter is this: the earth is not moving; it has a place of its own. But at the great white throne judgment, the earth will be removed; it will flee away and move for the first time in its history. After these events there will be a new heaven and a new earth: one which need not be sustained by the Lord in the same in­ tense way that this present world is sustained; for that new world will have been bought by the precious blood of the Son of God.

^And God said. Let there be a firmament in the midst o f the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. ^And God made the firmament, and divided the wa­ ters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. * And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
— Genesis 1:6-8
THE BIBLICAL FIRMAMENT
It took more than a year and a half to write this chapter. Indeed, the work on this chapter stalled not only the progress on this book but also stalled work on other geocentric projects such as publication of The Biblical Astronomer. The only resolution was to start this chapter with an account of my personal struggles with the nature of the Biblical firmament, the firmament God created on the second day of creation. In this chapter, I shall give an account of my discovery that the Planck medium, also known as the “vac­ uum state of space” and sundry other aliases, such as “maximons” and “Wheeler’s space-time foam,” is the firmament God created on the second day of creation. I shall start with the thinking that led me to that discovery and then demonstrate from Scripture, history, linguistics, and science that the Planck medium is the firmament created on the second day of the creation week as recounted in the first chapter of Genesis.
The Irresistible Force Meets the Immovable Object
In 1971, while I was a graduate student at Case Institute of Technology, I feared that my concentration in astrophysics at the University of Rochester, followed by my graduate work at Case,

The Firmament 53
left me with some holes in my education. As a result, I enrolled at Cuyahoga Community College and signed up for two courses, one in psychology and another in logic. Both classes were taught by Case graduate students in their relative majors (psychology and philosophy), and last I heard of them, both were employed as cab drivers, something that I, also, did on two occasions after earning my doctorate.
All I remember of the psych class was one or two relaxation techniques and some of B. F. Skinner’s imprinting works. I recol­ lect more of the subject matter in the logic class, including truth tables and the difference between valid and sound logic—not all valid proofs are sound, but all sound proofs are valid. One of the lasting things I learned from my friendship with the two professors outside of class was the logical answer to the old question, “What happens when an immovable object encounters an irresistible force?” The logical answer is, “Everything.” That explained many natural phenomena to me, most particularly the Bermuda Triangle where you have an “immovable object,” namely the heat in the ocean, and an “irresistible force,” namely the sun-driven wind. You end up with an “everything,” viz. hurricanes and rogue waves in both the water and the atmosphere.
The solution to the question of what happens if an irresistible force meets an immovable object became a founding principle of my research for the next several years. I was coming out of athe­ ism and at the time was more accurately described as an agnostic; I did not know whether God existed or not. I would be in that spiri­ tual state until early 1973.
Attention Span
Here I will only mention my personal recognition of the con­ cept of an attention span. I wrote about the concept and the ex­ periments leading to the discovery of attention span several years ago and published the work in The Biblical Astronomer.^ The the­ ory, developed in 1972, considers all human reasoning to be circu­ lar, given our finite knowledge. The attention span is the circum-

54 Chapter 6
ference (in seconds of time) of how long it takes an argument to go full circle.
Attention span complemented another key concept leading to the discovery of the firmament, namely, that theories are con­ structed around a vacuum state (i.e., a “hole”) in our knowledge; something we do not know but wish to learn or discover. In phys­ ics, we usually try to discover the form of the hole by formal means such as formal logic, deriving formulas, formal definitions, etc. But formulas are not enough. The descriptive structure must also include linguistic structures such as phrases, clauses, sen­ tences, paragraphs, chapters, etc. Christianity recognizes the “vac­ uum state” or the “hole in us” as the Word. In essence, the quest to fill a hole in our knowledge is a quest for a word or name that fits the hole. I have written at length about these matters also.
Life on a Neutron Star
After finishing my doctorate work in March o f 1973,1 drove a cab for three weeks to save up enough money to move to the Mon­ terey area of California. While there, the American Association for the Advancement of Science held its annual meeting in San Francisco. It just so happened that this particular meeting focused on Velikovsky’s work, but that had no bearing on my reason to attend the meetings. I was obviously interested in astronomy and hoped to find work. As it happened, I decided to attend the session on condensed stars—stars that are so compressed by their gravita­ tional field that a single teaspoonful would weigh hundreds of thousands of pounds on earth. One of those papers changed my concept of God.
The particular paper I refer to talked about neutron stars. As a star collapses under its own gravity or because the core of the star is pushed inwards by the explosion of an outer shell, the material in the star may get so compressed that the protons and electrons can no longer coexist but are squeezed together to form neutrons. A star in which this has happened is called a neutron star. The pa­ per presented evidenee that, at least near its surface, the neutrons

The Firmament 55
can organize themselves into structures analogous to molecules. The paper’s reader proposed that these molecular-type neutron globs might evolve into a sort of nuclear life.
The idea that life could be evolutionary conceivable on a neu­ tron star intrigued me. First, the reaction rates in nuclear processes are so fast that any such “life” would have evolved in seconds. Second, the conditions in a neutron star are analogous to the early conditions of the big bang. To me, that suggested that if life was present in the early stages of the big bang, it takes no great leap of faith to assume its presence before the start of the big bang. That further implied that the universe was created by a living entity, not by Chaos, the creator-god of Babylonians, pagans, and Humanists. That, dear reader was the end of my agnosticism. All I had left to do was to discover which of the millions of the world’s gods was the Creator.
I didn’t have to think long or explore very deeply to dismiss the man-gods such as the gods of the Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists, and humanists. Even the god of the Mohammedans I judged too small, for by instituting kismet (uncontrolled and unreasonable fate) Allah showed himself too small to control his own creation, especially since he “wound it up and walked away.” That left only the God of the Jews, and, by extension, the God of Protestantism. Of course, all human-form gods were out, which meant that the Pope, God’s substitute god on earth (Vicar of Christ), was too small, too; else why would God need a representative on earth other than himself, i.e., other than the Holy Ghost?
It took one reading through the Authorized Version from cover-to-cover and once more through the Gospels to convince me that the God presented there is the one and only God, the only one powerful enough to create the universe and still have no room for himself. My question of “Which of the gods is the Creator God?” was answered.

56 Chapter 6
The Birth of Geocentricity
In 1976 I was introduced to the geocentric nature of the Holy Bible. Harold Armstrong, who was then the editor of The Creation Research Society Quarterly, in a note requesting tolerance for each other among Creationists, mentioned that some Creationists, such as Walter van der Kamp, even believed that the Bible teaches that the earth is stationary in the center of the universe. Although I knew very well that there was no proof for or against the geocen­ tric universe, for me to take a stance on this issue I needed to be certain that there was no doubt in my mind that the Scripture is geocentric. At the time I was ignorant of the fact that the Author­ ized Version is the word of God, so my inquest on matters geocen­ tric centered on the mythical “original autographs.” The research consumed sixteen hours a day, six days a week, for three weeks and at the end I could only conclude that Scripture is probably geocentric.
I suppose, dear reader, that if we were face to face you might question, '"'Probably geocentric?” That is the strongest statement that anyone who believes that the inerrancy and inspiration of Scripture existed only in the original autographs can say. After all, we have never seen them and we don’t have them anywhere that we should recognize them. The meanings of the words used in the original languages became obsolete in the eighteenth century when the original word definitions listed in previous Bible dictionaries were discarded, secularized, and redefined. The original auto­ graphs are obsolete; indeed, they no longer exist. By the same to­ ken, the meanings carried by the words of the manuscripts in the original languages have been corrupted. It is thus no wonder that all I could conclude was that the Bible is probably geocentric. The definitive geocentric verses can only be recognized if one assumes that God gave the Scripture by revelation and that he must and will preserve his words from corruption by man and will not allow counterfeit versions to be inerrant or inspired by the Holy Ghost and, indeed, the Holy Ghost is not even mentioned by them, let alone indwelling them.

The Firmament 57
Not long afterwards, I did find the strong geocentric verses such as Joshua 10:13. Having committed myself to the presence of an inerrant, preserved Bible from the start of my first pass of read­ ing the Bible from cover-to-cover, I could only believe what was written. I had read the Authorized Bible, and in the course of my reading had proven it the inerrant, preserved word of God consist­ ing of the very words of God. The die was cast; I became, and re­ main, a geocentrist.
The Plenum /®ther
In 1977, after I had concluded that the Bible is geocentric, 1 searched the stacks of the University of Rochester’s library for theories and research detailing what is known of the light-bearing medium commonly called the $ther (now generally spelled as ether). The most useful book I found was called Modern /Ether Theory, written by Harold Aspden of Cambridge University.^ Aspden’s theory held that the ether is a plenum, an infinitely dense medium, uncreated, which is to say eternal and infinite in extent. Aspden’s theory could account for several phenomena not easily accounted for in modem physics, such as the phenomenon called “ball lightning.”
For several years thereafter I stmggled with the obvious he­ retical implication of a plenum; that Aspden’s ether has the proper­ ties of God and is thus indistinguishable from God. The problem is that such a plenum-ether should also have infinite energy or power (omnipotence), resulting in an infinite temperature that is clearly inimical to life. Aspden’s plenum could therefore not be a tme plenum. Still, Aspden’s plenum model makes perfect sense as a light-bearing medium. After several years of mathematical and physical dead ends, I finally decided I would try using logic in­ stead of mathematics to solve the plenum-God problem. As we shall see, that amounts to starting with God: however, it does not mean that logic is God.

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The Irresistible Force, the Immovable Object, and God
Upon learning that the logical answer to the question, “What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object” is “everything,” I recognized immediately that this answer related to the existence of God. Given the shortcomings of Aspden’s ple­ num, I next applied the principle to the theory of geocentricity to solve the problem of how a true, uncreated plenum can coexist with a created plenum. My logic went as follows, and is as close as I can get to a proof for the existence of God.
Try to imagine nothing. We typically imagine darkness or some symbolic way of representing nothing, but to truly visualize nothing is physically impossible. No matter how hard we try, we cannot imagine ourselves out of the “nothing.” It is impossible to picture nothing. Besides, we all know from Scripture that nothing is impossible.
So, if it is impossible to imagine nothing, let us try a different tack. This time, let’s explore the properties that characterize noth­ ing as a “thing.”
1. Does nothing have a size? How big is nothing? We might think its size is zero, but that doesn’t help, for zero size still has the property of size. Nothing cannot have the property of size.
2. Does nothing have any power? How powerful is nothing? Is it powerless, that is, it has no or zero power? But the property of zero power still has the property of power. We see then that our nothing cannot have the property of power, not even the property of powerlessness.
3. Can nothing have any intelligence? Can nothing be aware of its environment? If nothing were aware of its environ-
* M atthew 17:20— A nd Jesus said unto them , B ecause o f yo u r unbelief: for verily I say unto you. If ye have faith as a grain o f m ustard seed, ye shall say unto this m ountain. R em ove hence to yonder place; and it shall rem ove; and nothing shall be im possible unto you. Luke 1:37— For w ith God nothing shall be im possible. The sentence can be taken two w ays, having tw o shades o f meaning. In such cases, “given by inspiration” (II T im othy 3:16) dem ands that both be allow ed unless doing so m akes one or the other violate the integrity o f Scripture. The m odem double m eaning o f the word “gay” provides us w ith an exam ple o f such a violation.

The Firmament 59
ment, then it follows that its environment must be aware of it, in which case nothing becomes something. No, nothing can neither know nor sense; it cannot even have the prop­ erty of intelligence. 4. Can nothing exist? It cannot exist because it can’t have the property of existence.
We conclude that nothing cannot have any real properties whatsoever not even the property of “thingness,” for if it did, it would no longer be nothing but a thing. We see then that nothing is impossible.
But when we say that nothing is impossible, aren’t we saying it has the property of impossibility? Yes, that is the one property that nothing can have; it is impossible. If it is impossible, then its complement or inverse, everything, must be possible.
We started this section by examining the properties nothing can have. We noticed that nothing is impossible; it cannot exist. Existence, then, must have the inverse properties. These properties are:
1. For no size, the inverse is infinite size. We call that omni­ presence.
2. For no power, the inverse is infinite power. We call that omnipotence.
3. For no intelligence, the inverse is infinite intelligence. We call that omniscience.
4. For no existence, the inverse is infinite existence. We call that the Great I AM.
So we see that since nothing cannot exist, we are left with omni­ present, omnipotent, and omniscient Existence. Those properties are the same as God’s properties; so let’s call the infinite existence before whom there was nothing and after whom there is nothing, God.
For the moment, let us focus on the nature of omnipotence. Omnipotence is infinite power, everywhere. By definition, om­ nipotence is omnipresent, for if omnipotence is not omnipresent.

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then there exists a place where omnipotence has no power. In that place, the “omni-” (meaning everywhere) of omnipotence is vio­ lated and omnipotence is no longer omnipotent. We see, then, that omnipotence must be omnipresent.
Now omnipotence signifies infinite power, and power has cer­ tain properties. Consider another infinite property of God; God is light. Scripture tells us that no man can see God and live. Light has power, so omnipotence means that God’s light is also infinite in power. That means that the region in which the omnipotence of God is omnipresent has an infinite amount of light, and, by impli­ cation, is of infinite temperature. This, of course, brings us to the problem we had earlier, namely that the creation could not exist in a plenum unless God put aside such properties harmful to creation over a small volume (compared to infinity). Our problem thus re­ duces to how God restricted his light over the region of space we call the Universe to allow humans to exist long enough to accom­ plish God’s purpose for creation.
One of the properties associated with power is mass. That means that one of the properties of omnipotence is omnipresent, infinite mass. In other words, the omnipresent omnipotence of God requires that he be infinitely dense, where we use the word “dense” in the same sense that gold is denser than water.
History of the Plenum Model
The belief that space is infinitely dense is very ancient, dating back at least 2500 years to the ancient Greeks who, most likely, learned it from the Hebrews exiled in Babylon. The Greeks called it a Plenum because in a plenum every volume of space is fully— plentifully—as filled as any other volume of space. The first re­ corded mention of the plenum dates from the early fifth century B.C.
In the early fifth century B.C., a Greek philosopher named Leucippus put forth a scandalous proposal that maybe there was a limit to how small a volume of space could be cut and still have more matter therein. He proposed that at some small-enough scale.

The Firmament 61
a volume of space could not be further divided and still include matter. The volume at which that occurred would be the smallest particle making up the material of the universe. That particle he called an atom and thus came about the birth of atomic theory. Leucippus proposed that the physical universe is made up of atoms moving in a void.
The defender of the established plenum model, Parmenides, argued that since a void is full of nothing, any two particles would be separated by nothing and you’d be back at the plenum model. In hindsight, Parmenides and Leucippus were both right and we’ll return to that later. For now, we observe that we started with noth­ ing, found everything, and are ending up with a next-to-nothing void. The reader has probably recognized that the void is now called vacuum, and refers to outer space, where the average density is fewer than two atoms per cubic yard (or meter) of space.
For a few centuries the debate between plenum and the atomic theories raged until Greek philosophers concluded that the plenum model was impossible. After all, they reasoned, we could not move if we were encased in lead; how much less if we were en­ cased in an infinitely dense medium. Thus, to this present time, atoms separated by a void became the predominant model of space.
Still, every now and then over the intervening two millennia, the plenum model would find new life...for a while. After all, the void is a terrible thing. It causes all sorts of problems. Consider the action-at-a-distance problem for gravity, for instance, particu­ larly the case of two bodies attracting one another with a void or vacuum between them. What transmits the attraction between them? What mechanism communicates the presence of one body to the other? Is it a rain of some “bullet-like” bodies, much smaller than atoms, which press the two bodies towards each other? Or is it some sort of strain, like tension on a rubber sheet that is inherent in the void? If, so, the void must have some property able to transmit the strain from one body to the other; but if it has such a property, there cannot be a void between the two particles and the void would not be void. These questions and answers are known

62 Chapter 6
as the action-at-a-distance problem, considerations which show that space cannot be a void. No wonder that the plenum refused to suffocate in the void’s vacuum.
To solve such problems with an atomic-void theory, a new form of space-medium had to be invented. First, it was proposed that space was filled with tiny particles called ultramundane corpuscules that zipped through space in all directions. To account for gravity, it was assumed that solid bodies absorbed a tiny frac­ tion of the particle flux which would press objects together by par­ ticle shadowing. This is Fatio de Duilier’s (1664-1753) model (now commonly called Le Sage’s model). It was embraced by Isaac Newton as the most likely cause of gravity since it avoided the action-at-a-distance problem of the void. Le Sage’s version of the corpuscular model has been resurrected over the last 35-odd years by the talented heuristic mathematician, James N. Hanson, as well as by anti-relativists such as the late and to-be-lamented Apeiron Press’ stable of authors who took these matters seriously.
Although the Le Sagean model solves the problem of actionat-a-distance for gravity and could accommodate the particle na­ ture of light, the Le Sagean model could not account for the wave­ like behavior of light. This came to a head in the nineteenth cen­ tury when fundamental experiments with light revealed that light might be a wave instead of a particle. At that time, two physicists, Fresnel and Arago, definitively demonstrated that light behaved as a wave. Waves can only travel through a medium such as air or water. So it looked like there might be something more substantial than a void separating the atoms and corpuscules. A new form of space-medium was proposed specifically to account for the wave­ like behavior of light. It is called the ether, signifying an intangi­ ble medium characterized by lightness and insubstantiality. You’d think that would settle the matter, but it didn’t. To this very day, particle-like behavior of light continues to live side-by-side with wave-like behavior. (Le Sage’s model and Hanson’s work are covered more fully in Chapter 26 on Newton and Berkeley.)

The Firmament 63

Enter the Firmament

The recognition of the Biblical firmament began around 1898

when the German physicist, Max Planck, was toying around with

the fundamental constants; that is, he

was combining three constants (the

gravitational constant, the speed of

light, and the Planck constant) and

found out that he could recombine

them to define a set of fundamental

units which he called “natural” >|c
units. There is a natural unit of

length, another of time, another of

mass, another for electric charge,

and still another for temperature

(Table I). It looked as if Planck had

discovered a new type of atom,

making up a new type of medium. But his new atom is vastly smaller than the atom making up the atomic

Figure 1: Max Planck
(N R A O )

matter we all know and love. Planck’s atom is generally called a

Planck particle. The Planck particles are tightly compressed one

against another forming a medium called the Planck medium. The

question arises: are these natural units real or are they an artifact of

our physics? I believe they are real because the properties they

reveal about the firmament are too immense not to be real. The

Planck medium has all the earmarks of being the firmament of

Genesis 1.

Is the Planck Firmament the Firmament of the Holy Bible?

Before we conclude that the Planck medium is the firmament of the Bible, we need to see if the word, firmament, is a proper

You can create other sets o f fundamental units by adding electric charge, e, but the original set o f constants, G, c, and h are the most fundamental; so much so that they are sometimes called “God’s units.”

64 Chapter 6

translation of the underlying Hebrew word. It makes little sense to assume the two are the same unless we find out why God needed to create the firmament in the first place. We will now show that “firmament” is the correct translation and that the firmament is a shield that protects us from the “consuming fire” that God is. It will also help us to ascertain the properties God demands of the firmament as a created plenum.

TABLE I

PROPERTIES OF A PLANCK PARTICLE

Length

= (h

= 1.616040 x 10'^^ cm

Time

= (h G/c^)’^^ = 5.390528 x lO^^^ sec

Mass

= (h

= 2.176570 x 10'^ ^

Temperature == (h cVG)'^^/k = 1.416859 x 10 ^ K

Charge

=

<\>^'^ <t>'*

= 5.62255x10'^

cm^^^ sec'^

= (h c)*^^= 11.7 esu

In this table, G represents Newton's gravitational constant, c the speed of light, and h is Planck’s angular momentum constant; also, m is the Planck Mass, I is the Planck length, and t is the Planck time. Esu stands
for “electrostatic units. ’’

Let’s imagine for a moment that we are God. We have some­ thing we would like to make known. Clearly, as members of the Trinity: the Father, Word, and Holy Ghost, we have perfect knowl­ edge of all things, so there is nothing we can reveal to each other that we did not already know. However, being an omniscient, om­ nipotent God, we could create beings to whom we could reveal those things we already know about. The Apostle Paul states it this way in Romans 9:22-24:

What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:

The Firmament 65
23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,
Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
If, as God, we want to reveal these things, we first have to create a safe haven for both the vessels of wrath and the vessels of mercy; for since we, as God, are omnipotent, the energy density within us is infinite and would instantly consume any unshielded vessels we would create. We would have to make a space for those vessels of wrath and mercy (the heaven of Genesis 1:1) and then endue that space with provisions to sustain physical life as well as the founda­ tions for wisdom and revelation (light) and then build a shield to protect the vessels we shall create inside the shielded region. I submit to you that said shield was made on the second day of crea­ tion and in English is called thefirmament.
I don’t know about you, but as a former professor of computer science. I’ve dealt with virtual reality quite extensively; and in my virtual ear I can hear a chorus of objections: “You blankety-blankblank idiot! Don’t you know that Bible scholars have proven that ‘firmament’ should be translated as ‘expanse’ and that there is nothing firm about it?”
Another virtual soul cries, “Heresy! Don’t you know that the firmament was a water canopy surrounding the entire earth before the flood?” (That theory is now totally discredited by Creation­ ists.)
Still another, secure in his liberalism, snickers: “Don’t you know that the firmament is a reference to the ancient Egyptian cosmology, which Moses learned from his Egyptian schooling, where the sky is a star-studded dome, resting atop a circle of mountains and so covering the flat earth?”
Obviously, I don’t know any of that. I suppose we’ll have to try to convince these virtual virtuosi with a little history lesson. But first I must deal with the charge by
* Indeed, I’m editing this chapter on a virtual computer, one o f three that run on this laptop.

66 Chapter 6
some that attributing physical properties to God is heresy. In par­ ticular, is the claim that God is a plenum heretical?
Heresy According to Scripture
The conclusion I was led to—that God is a plenum—is obvi­ ous in hindsight given that God is uncreated, eternal, omnipresent, and omnipotent. Still, the conclusion that God is a plenum is a bold one, not to mention fraught with danger, since some may con­ sider it heretical. The problem is that it is perfectly reasonable, and the Lord does appeal to reason in Isaiah 1:18 when he says to Is­ rael, “Come now, and let us reason together.” So, how did I reach the conclusion that claiming God is a plenum is not necessarily heretical?
To answer that we must first define the word heresy. Usually Scripture defines a word near or by its first use, and the first time the word heresy appears in the English Scripture is in Acts 24:14 where Paul is defending himself from the Jewish Pharisees and Sadducees before the governor, Felix. Paul confesses to Felix:
But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets.
From the principle of first usage it follows that the accusing Jews’ definition of heresy is to believe all things which are written in the law and in the prophets; in short, to believe all things written in Scripture. Even today, the Jews consider belief of all things in the Bible as heresy, for the vast majority esteem the Talmud—
Modem versions change heresy to sect. The Greek word is the same for both, so I consulted the Latin, using it as a commentary to meet the deficiency in vo­ cabulary o f the Greek language. The Latin texts use the word haeresis here, which is the very root word of our word, heresy. The Latin can distinguish be­ tween sect and heresy, the word secta meaning sect. The word heresy is thereby authenticated and the new versions’ “sect” is shown to be a dodge; an attempt to avoid the charge o f heresy form Bible believers since the translators stand with the Jews against Paul’s confession.

The Firmament 67
layers upon layers of speculations and commentary—more authori­ tative than the Tenach (Old Testament). From the context of the verse we see that, scripturally, heresy hinges on faith in the written words of God. Furthermore, remember that Paul was, as he put it, “a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee” (Acts 23:6).
But heresy lies in the eye of the beholder. The Church of Rome, for instance, declares anyone a heretic who rejects the dec­ larations of its Magisterium, which is the teaching authority of the Catholic Church which, in turn, is said to be embodied in the cur­ rent bishops of the Catholic Church in union with the Pope. He is branded a heretic whether he was ever a member of the Catholic Church or not. Those thusly accused of heresy face a possible death sentence. In kind, the Jews, too, were seeking the life of Paul before Felix. Most sects esteem heresy a sin worthy of death.
We see, then, that what the world deems heretical is to believe all of Scripture versus the world’s traditions: the traditions of men. However, that is not the Scripture’s definition of heresy. The defi­ nition of a heretic in the Bible is someone who knows correct Bible doctrine and knowingly rejects it by contradicting, countermand­ ing, or “correcting” it. That means that what Bible believers con­ sider heresy is for a believer to knowingly teach things contrary to Scripture. Under that definition, an atheist cannot be called a here­ tic for he makes no profession of believing Scripture, let alone faith in God unless he once espoused Bible doctrines. Further­ more, someone who unwittingly teaches something contrary to Scripture cannot be condemned as a heretic until formally con­ fronted with his heretical belief two or three times (Titus 3:10-11). Note that even so, ostracism is the only penalty; there is no capital punishment to be imposed by man for heresy in the New Testa­ ment, not even for those who pervert the words of God (Revelation
Titus 3:10-11— A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; " Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being con­ demned o f himself

68 Chapter 6
22:19);* which is a form of the sin unto death (I John 5:16).^ The Lord is the executioner in the Age of Grace.
In summary, a heretic is someone who knowingly teaches as Scripture something contrary to Scripture. Such people are usually enamored with an idea or a teaching which they consider a supe­ rior (meaning clearer, more understandable, or more authoritative) revelation than that given in Scripture.
The Physical Attributes of God
For several years I pondered the spiritual versus the physical nature of God. It was the mention of the power of God throughout Scripture and most particularly in Romans 1:20^ that led me to se­ rious contemplation that God not only has a body but also that the physical presence may be manifested in a variety of physical forms. The context of Romans 1:20 is that the eternal power and Godhead may be invisible, but they are made manifest in the crea­ tion.
When God created Adam he created Adam in the image of himself (Genesis 1:26-27).^ That image includes the triune nature of soul, body, and spirit, corresponding to the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. As the scripture says, Jesus—in the flesh—is the express image of God (Hebrews 1:3).** How can it be heresy to take these things literally?
Revelation 22:19— And if any man shall take away from the words o f the book o f this prophecy, God shall take away his part out o f the book o f life, and out of the holy city, andfrom the things which are written in this book. ^I John 5:16b— There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it. ^ Romans 1:20— For the invisible things o f him from the creation o f the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; ^ Genesis 1:26-27— And God said. Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl o f the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image o f God created he him; male and female created he them.
Hebrews 1:3— ...being the brightness o f his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word o f his power....

The Firmament 69
There are two reasons why people believe that God has no body or form. The first is derived from Gnosticism and the second is based on a misunderstanding of the nature of spirit. Neither is sound.
Gnosticism is the belief that the flesh in particular and matter in general is innately evil. This is based on Plato’s philosophy that the idea of something is good (ideal) but the physical form, which is subject to corruption and decay, is not. For instance, the idea of a table, in the mind of its inventor or builder, is good, even immor­ tal in a sense; but the ideal, when implemented in the physical world, is subject to corruption and is thus evil. This rationale for Gnosticism appeals to a certain type of intellectual who then car­ ries said rationale further and concludes that since matter is vile, God would never have manifested himself in vile flesh because if he did, he would have corrupted himself and would no longer be God.
Today, this type of individual is at home with liberalism; and I might add that modem liberalism dates back at least as far as the time of Hezekiah (Isaiah 32:5-6). Indeed, religious liberals be­ lieve that Gnosticism was the original Christianity and that the New Testament was written a couple centuries after the “historic” Jesus. They believe this because I, II, III John and Jude were writ­ ten against Gnosticism. But if the New Testament was written in the first century, then Gnosticism could not be the original Christi­ anity but has to be the first Christian heresy. There is, of course, no proof that the New Testament was written after the first century, especially since fragments of the New Testament were found in the Qumran caves sealed circa A.D. 70."*
We now undertake the second reason why people discount the physical body of God. One of the most commonly misunderstood properties of God involves that God is called a Spirit in John
Isaiah 32:5-6— The vile person shall be no more called liberal, nor the churl said to be bountiful. ^ For the vile person will speak villany, and his heart will work iniquity, to practise hypocrisy, and to utter error against the LORD, to make empty the soul o f the hungry, and he will cause the drink o f the thirsty to fail.

70 Chapter 6
4:24.* Most people see a spirit as a disembodied, amorphous thing that has no form or physical representation. However, that is not what Scripture teaches; it teaches that spirits do have bodies.
Scripture teaches that the spirit of man comes from God and returns to him at death (Ecclesiastes 12:7).^ The spirit is given us by God in order that we may have a conscience. The soul, how­ ever, is in charge. Thus sin is attributed to the soul. Man’s body dies because of Adam’s sin; the soul dies for rejecting God’s atonement for sin. Man’s spirit, which is a portion of God’s spirit, should be in charge. Indeed, to be bom of the Spirit, of which Je­ sus speaks in John 3:5, means to allow the Spirit the leadership; thus, any man who wants to worship God “must worship him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24). The ultimate Spirit is the Holy Ghost, the third person of the Trinity. The spirit is immortal, not the soul, and obviously, not the body. People thoughtlessly talk about “your immortal soul,” but the Bible knows nothing of that. Scripture teaches that, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4, 20). So neither the body nor the soul is immortal but the spirit.
The basis for this idea that the spirit has no body or form comes from Luke 24:37-43 where the resurrected Jesus tells his disciples, who were frightened by his sudden appearance among them, not to be afraid:
37 But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that T O
they had seen a spirit. And he said unto them. Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. And
* John 4;24— God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. Modem bibles greatly err when they drop the “a” from “a Spirit.” By doing so they allow that all spirits are God; even lying spirits and the spirits of devils. These unclean spirits were created by God, but they are not part o f the holy Spirit nor o f the Holy Ghost. ^ Ecclesiastes 12:7— Then [upon death] shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.

The Firmament 71
when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet. '’’And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them. Have ye here any meat? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And he took it, and did eat before them.
Jesus does not say here that a spirit has no body or form; he says that a spirit’s body is different from the resurrected body he has. We learn here that whereas a spirit has a visible form, it cannot be handled physically.
Indeed, Zechariah 12:1 tells us that a spirit does have a form and that God forms it inside each of us. Of course, Zechariah’s reference to a form is general; it does not specify the exact shape. Angels are called ministering spirits and there is no doubt in Scripture that they have bodies (Hebrews 1:13-14),^ but the Holy Ghost is seen in the bodily shape of a dove at the baptism of Jesus (Luke 3:22).^ In Matthew 14:26^ the disciples mistook Jesus, who was walking on the water, for a spirit. Jesus did not correct them to say that spirits are invisible or that they don’t exist, and so the implication is clear; spirits do have a form and corporeal presence.
But that a spirit does have a form is not all; it also has a corpo­ real presence. Scripture tells us of God’s form and body through the many mentions of God’s face, his hands, and even his wings. Moses saw God’s back parts, albeit not his face for that would have killed Moses (Exodus 33:20-23). Clearly, if God has back
Zechariah 12:1— The burden o f the word o f the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit o f man within him. ^ Hebrews 1:13-14— But to which o f the angels said he at any time. Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool? Are they not all minis­ tering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation? ^Luke 3:22— And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased. ^ Matthew 14;26— And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying. It is a spirit; and they cried out for fear.

72 Chapter 6
parts that can be seen, he must have some form, even a physical presence.
Now it can be countered that God is invisible as stated in I Timothy 1:17 and Hebrews 11:27. However, invisibility does not mean that the invisible thing has no form or matter. A mirage is due to an air layer that is invisible but the reality of is physical presence is manifest in the mirage. It seems reasonable that God should be invisible so that no one could accidentally look upon his face. After all, there are things invisible. The wind has certain in­ visibility, but it is physical. Likewise, the firmament is invisible, but it certainly has substance. Visibility is a human requirement. Jesus said he had seen the Father, the Godhead, (John 6:46); and lest you think he saw through some mystical spiritual eyes, con­ sider John 14:9 where Jesus says to Philip, “he that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” At the time, the disciples were blind when it came to spiritual eyes. Clearly God has a body in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ who came in the flesh (I John 4:2-3)^ Paul calls this a mystery in I Timothy 3:16 where he writes:
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.
Consider the Trinity for a moment. The Father corresponds to the soul, the Word is the body, and the Holy Ghost is the Spirit. The Holy Ghost bears witness of the Word, and the Word bears witness of the Father. The Word came physically in written form in the Old Testament, then physically in the flesh in the person of
John 6:46— Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is o f God, he hath seen the Father. ^ I John 4:2-3— Hereby know ye the Spirit o f God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is o f God: ^And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not o f God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.

The Firmament 73
Jesus, the Christ, and then physically in writing again in the form of the New Testament. His final revelation will come when God’s wrath is full, at which time Jesus will inherit the kingdom of heaven, that is, the restoration of Israel. This all implies God has a physical presence, a body, in other words.
Finally, I Corinthians 15:44 explicitly states that a spirit has a body.
There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
A man greatly errs when he claims that a spirit has no form or body. So there is no reason why God cannot be described by the word plenum. It is no heresy then to describe God’s omnipotence as a plenum.
It was not until I understood the fundamental principles under­ lying these matters that I felt safe in allowing that God is a plenum. However, I knew from the start that Harold Aspden’s impersonal plenum, mentioned early on in this chapter, couldn’t be the true plenum because a plenum is more than physical; it must embrace all, including the metaphysical or spiritual realms. In other words, for you technical readers, the mathematics describing the plenum must be complex. (For those of you who survived two years of high school algebra, complex means it must involve imaginary numbers as well as real numbers.)
Linguistic Arguments for a Solid Firmament
The creation of the firmament takes place on the second day of the creation week. In Genesis 1:6-8 the Scripture records the event as follows:
^ 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.

74 Chapter 6

^ And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

Now, there is nothing in the account that requires the firma­

ment to be a hollow shell, an expanse. Yet modem scholarship

confidently informs us that the word, “firmament” hearkens back

to the cosmologies of ancient Egypt and Babylon. To those peo­

ples, the sky was a shell, particularly a hemisphere that covered the

Thes^^^Heavs.- -- ... -

disk of the flat earth

as the dome of a serv­

ing dish covers the

pheasant.

Tmth is. I’ve

never been able to

confirm the firma-

ment-is-a-shell model

in the source docu­

ments of any ancient

Mid-Eastern cosmol­

ogy. The closest I’ve

eome is the story of

Nut, the night-sky

goddess who is often

Figure 2: The Scriptural Firmament (Not to scale)

portrayed as a naked

female

stretched

across the sky; Nut

swallows the sun on the first day of spring when he enters her

mouth, the sun then passes through her star-studded body to

emerge from her birth canal nine months later. Other accounts

have the birth-death process happening daily. In either case, it is

interesting to note that the only way Nut, the creator-mother of

* An interesting thing happens as one draws closer to the edge o f the firmament. The firmament’s protection o f atomic matter fades away so that its extreme den­ sity and temperature become manifest. The firmament is impregnably solid at its edge, in effect acting as a shell. This is the reason why the wording o f Scrip­ ture is somewhat ambiguous when it comes to the concept o f the firmament.

The Firmament 75

Egypt’s god, could eat the sun without using her hand is if the sun

were a wafer, in which case she need only tilt her head from the

position pietured in temple depictions. This is the closest that Bi­

ble critics are able to eome to support their claim that Moses’ fir­

mament heralds from Egyptian cosmology.

The most ancient

Egyptian explanation for

the universe is that each

day the sun embarks and

sails across the sky in his

eternal bark trying to keep

peace and joy in the world.

But every evening, after the

sun disembarks, the great

primordial lotus blossom

closes its petals and sinks

once more into the waters

of the abyss. Darkness

reigns throughout the night

until the sun god within the

lotus is reborn in the morn­

ing. Then the lotus rises to

the surface of the deep,

Figure 3: Nut about to swallow the sun in spring

opens, and the young sun embarks his bark to start

the journey all over again. Just what Moses ineluded from these

stories into his creation aceount of the firmament escapes me, but

apparently not the virtuosi.

The dish interpretation of “firmament” dates from the eight­

eenth century when all the Bible dictionaries were secularized and

rewritten. Languages such as Hebrew, Latin, Greek, and English

have sacred, as well as secular forms. (The English sacred form

survives today in the Authorized Bible.) Each sacred language is

designed solely to embody the Scripture in that language and is

considered sacred to its faithful and not to be corrupted by secular­

ists.

76 Chapter 6
In the eighteenth century, however—as a direct result of the Copemican Revolution’s success in removing the authority of the Bible from the physical realm—there arose a movement whose goal was to “recover” and “correct” what God physically “meant” to say but did not have the wits to say correctly in the first place. The movement, commonly known as “higher criticism,” rejected the established theology that God had given man his words by revelation and that God would actively preserve his words, even his Bible through his seed. Instead, the critical movement em­ braced the notion that the Scripture which was given by inspiration of God now exists inerrantly only in heaven and must be recovered by a class of virtuosi since only they esteem themselves equipped to recognize that which God had given by inspiration but didn’t think worthy of preserving in the first place.
It was this movement with their assumption that only the “book of Nature” is inerrant, that set about to secularize the mean­ ings of the sacred languages by adding, or replacing, or re-coloring the sacred meanings of the Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, and Latin words with secular meanings. That way these theologians could appear scientifically and historically “respectable.” Most of those virtuosi appealed back to pagan cultures to extract the so-called “correct” meaning which God was unable to preserve. And so it came to pass that firmament, a word that suggests a solid medium, was replaced with a hollow, metal shell covering a flat earth.
Historical Precedence for the “Firmament” Translation
Now the word “firmament” is a translation into English of the Latin, firmamentum. In classical Latin, the word means “some­ thing which strengthens or supports.” That was how the underly­ ing Hebrew word, raqija was translated into the Old Latin Bible around A.D. 130. About twenty years later, ca. A.D. 150, Aquila did his translation of the Old Testament into Greek. He translated raqija as stereoma, which properly means a firm or solid structure. In Hebrew, the root word underlying raqija is raka, meaning to

The Firmament 11
condense, to make firm or solid. These translators apparently sup­ port the solid firmament model.
All English translations up through the AV, including the Douay-Rheims, chose “firmament” for their translation although most European translations render the Hebrew as “expanse.” The latter word is neutral, allowing for either the hollow shell or solid model. Add to that the debate between Leucippus and Parmenides about the plenum vs. atom models, which established the plenum model as the most ancient cosmology, and the linguistic support for the firmament model is secured.
The Firmament As a Created Plenum
Before we consider the firmament as a created plenum, we need to appreciate some of the properties of the Planck particles which make up the “atoms” of the firmament. It is hard to com­ prehend how tiny a particle of firmament is. If we were to enlarge a Planck particle to the size of a typical marble (about 1 cm), the diameter of the marble would be enlarged to more than 12,500 universes laid side-by-side.^ Or, if we were to enlarge the Planck particle to the size of a hydrogen atom, the hydrogen atom would span some ten million earths laid side-by-side, engulfing the entire orbit of Neptune far enough to encroach Pluto’s orbit.
Likewise, how much larger is the largest stable nuclear parti­ cle we know, the proton, than a Planck particle? A proton’s size is 1.32x10'’^ cm.* Compared to the 1.62x10'^^ cm size for the Planck particle, the proton is some 10 or one hundred thousand trillion times larger that of a Planck particle. The figure 10 is said to be “twenty orders of magnitude.” Of those twenty orders of magni­ tude, we are clueless of at least eighteen of them (the Higgs boson is about one-hundredth the size of a proton but its existence has yet to be confirmed). Those twenty orders of magnitude are not
For the remainder o f the book, the reader who has no sense o f the size o f a centimeter may think o f a centimeter is a bit less than half an inch. Given the nature o f the calculations and the uncertainties in both the mass and size of the universe, you could as well read, “inch” instead o f centimeter.

78 Chapter 6

empty, mind you; they are packed with Planck particles, as is the

entire universe, as well as every atom, and every fundamental par­

ticle. (See Figure 4.) Those twenty orders of magnitude provide a

buffer between atomic matter and the matter constituting the fir­

mament. The heat of the firmament (a hundred-million-trillion-

trillion degrees) cannot penetrate it, nor can the extreme density of

the firmament be felt by the atomic matter making up our universe.

The Planck particles are too small to directly affect the universe in

general and us in particular.

Now, like any good

particle, the Planck parti­

cle has a mass as well as a

size. In this case, the

mass is only a couple of

hundred-thousandths of a

gram (there are roughly 27

grams in an ounce). With

a size and a mass, we can

Figure 4: Two Layers o f Planck Particles (Figure by Martin Selbrede)

compute the density of a Planck medium, that is, the density of the firma­

ment. When we run the numbers, we find that the density of the

Planck particle, which will roughly equal the density of the firma­

ment, is about 4x10^^ grams/cm^.* In comparison, the mass of the

universe is estimated at 6x10^^ gm.^ That means that if we packed

the entire universe into one cubic centimeter—about the size of a

small sugar cube— then we would have 56 of the 93 zeroes in the

exponent making up the density of the firmament. We’d have to

keep packing more and more universes into the sugar cube until -5 - 7
we’ve packed in some 10 universes. Yes, the density of the fir­

mament is 10^^ universes per cubic centimeter. If the firmament is

the same size as is currently estimated for the universe, (a radius of 2x10^^ cm) then the firmament’s mass is a whopping 123 uni-

4.220x10^^ assuming a Planck particle has a spherical shape. If we assume the Planck particle is a cube, the density is 5.128x10^^ gm/cm^. ^Assuming a universe’s mass is 6x10^® gm (based on the baryon count).

The Firmament 79
verses. Clearly, the firmament is by far the most massive object that God created during the creation week.
We’ve previously noted that the Planck particle’s mass is 2.2x10' gm and that its size is 1.62x10' cm. Also, the particle is electrically charged with a charge of 11.7 esu, meaning that the charge of a Planck particle is almost twelve times the charge on an electron or a proton. It is that charge that is the target of the vari­ ous “perpetual motion” zero-point-energy machines promoted on the Internet. The firmament’s electric charge property is also at the core of Harold Aspden’s plenum theory of the ether. Significantly, the Planck particle has no magnetic properties. To me, this implies that the electric fields in the universe will exhibit wave properties while magnetic fields will foster particle properties.
In Table 1 (pg. 64), which tabulates the Planck particle proper­ ties we see that the Planck particle is on the hot side. The Planck particle has a temperature of 1.4x10 K. It so happens that the “black-body” radiation curve of a body at the Planck temperature has its peak at the Planck length. For comparison, the black-body peak for the temperature of the universe is located at 2.7 K and is called “the cosmic background radiation.”
So, why are we not instantly vaporized by the firmament? Two reasons: firstly, the Planck particle is the size that a particle of a Planck mass (2x10'^ gm) would have if it were compressed into a black hole. That implies that the surface of a Planck particle will behave similarly to a black hole, namely, that no light, heat, or ra­ diation can escape from it. Even though the Planck temperature is of the order of 10 Kelvins, none of the radiation can escape the surface of the particle. Secondly, even if radiation were to escape from the surface of a Planck particle, its wavelength is far too short—by twenty orders of magnitude— to affect the universe of atoms. Besides, it is simply reabsorbed into the firmament before it travels more than a Planck length or two. As a result, we are
You may be familiar with the normal curve such as we find in the counts o f IQ scores. The energy o f photons similarly pile around a peak which is called the Planck temperature. The curve traced out by the photon counts is called the black-body radiation curve.

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quite safe from being vaporized by the firmament...at least for now.
Clearly, the firmament is by far the most massive thing God created. Its mass is estimated at 2 x 1 gm. Is it any wonder, then, that the firmament dictates the physics of the universe?
But if the firmament is that dense, how can we move through it? It was the atheist Bertrand Russell who answered that question. He discovered that in a true plenum motion could exist provided it is cyclical and the plenum and its motions are eternal and uncre­ ated.^ But the firmament is not a true plenum, so how can we move through it? The answer is that the universe of atomic matter must perceive the firmament as if it were a true plenum. Likewise, the motions allowed through the firmament must all be cyclical. Thus all atomic particles behave as waves. Waves are cyclical and so are allowed to move through a plenum. In the firmament’s case, the wavelengths of the atomic particles and photons are too long for the firmament to detect them, just as the wavelength of light is too long for the molecules of glass to detect and absorb them. In turn, any straight-line motion through the vacuum of space cannot be detected by the firmament.
All particles act as waves insofar as the firmament is con­ cerned. A particle at rest relative to the firmament acts as a stand­ ing wave (the type of wave started by plucking a guitar string) and its wavelength is called a “Compton wavelength.” For instance, the Compton wavelength of a Planck particle is a Planck length. For a particle moving through the firmament, its wavelength is known as the “deBroglie wavelength.” The moving wavelength of a particle is shorter than its static, Compton wavelength. As a nu­ clear particle moves faster and faster through the firmament, its energy increases which makes the particle appear more and more massive. Likewise, its wavelength gets shorter and shorter. Once the nuclear particle’s energy-laden mass approaches the Planck mass and its wavelength approaches a Planck length, the nuclear particle and the Planck-particle ocean detect each other; and the
Remember, E=mc^; energy is mass and mass is energy.

The Firmament 81
hapless moving particle, now traveling close to the speed of light, is absorbed into the firmament.
Earlier we saw that the Compton wavelength of a proton (that is, its size) is about 20 orders of magnitude longer than that of a Planck particle. We know next to nothing of the spatial properties in those 20 orders of magnitude, but we do know that it is filled to capacity with the stuff of the firmament. To allow motion through a dense, created plenum, it is sufficient that the particles’ wave­ lengths be very much longer than those of the particles making up the created plenum. Twenty orders of magnitude minimizes the chance that the proton and Planck particle will ever sense each other unless the proton moves so fast that its effective mass ap­ proaches the Planck mass, at which point the proton will be ab­ sorbed into the firmament. Those two conditions, the huge differ­ ence in wavelengths between Planck particle and proton and the resistance a mass encounters as it moves faster and faster through the firmament, serve to guarantee that no nuclear particle can ever be detected by the firmament and vice-versa. That, in turn, means that we can move freely through the firmament.
In the ways we have outlined in the previous paragraphs, we see that—to atomic matter but not necessarily to mankind—the created firmament is indistinguishable from God, who is the true, uncreated plenum. We end up with a true, infinitely dense plenum, which is a property of the omnipotence of God, and a created ple­ num, the firmament, which serves as a barrier between God and us to shield us from God’s omnipotent properties. In that sense, the firmament is a false god. For two reasons: first, the firmament’s function as a barrier between us and the loving mercy of God, and second, its God-like property, God did not declare the firmament “Good” in the day that he created it (Genesis 1:8).
Light and the Firmament
What about light waves and the firmament? Earlier we saw that the ether, an ephemeral concept, was postulated solely to ac-

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count for the propagation of light. Can the firmament be responsi­

ble for the transmission of light? The answer is, “Yes.”

At least three types of waves can exist in the firmament.

These are: transverse waves, longitudinal waves, and thermal

waves. Whether or not these waves actually occur in the firma­

ment will not be argued here. Let me just state that in the firma­

ment these waves are mechanical, not electromagnetic, although

their appearance in the universe of atomic matter will likely be

electromagnetic. Thermal waves are not relevant to this report al­

though they possibly play a role in the firmament’s shielding func­

tion.

Transverse waves are waves that manifest themselves in two

dimensions. A rope tied to a doorknob and then shaken up and

down is a transverse wave. Light is also a transverse wave. When

the standard classical expression for transverse waves is applied to

the firmament, the speed of the wave equals the speed of light to at

least five significant digits. This implies that the firmament plays a

pivotal role in the transmission of electromagnetic waves through

space. It also means that the firmament dictates the physical be­

havior and properties of light waves.

ir,t (c)

(r) (c)

(r)

(c)

(r) (c)

(r)

Figure 5: A Longitudinal Wave
Longitudinal waves are compression waves, such as sound waves or shock waves. This waveform squeezes particles together into a region of high pressure (compression). The compression depletes the surrounding areas of particles. That creates a void, a low-pressure area (rarefaction) on both sides of the high-pressure area (Figure 5). The particles pushed back into the low-pressure area are compressed to a high-pressure area, and the process re­ peats itself by radiating outwards from its source. A slinky is an example of a longitudinal wave.