You don't know anything about what the Bible says. When a Bible believer says something is not to be taken literally, it is because it is CONTRARY to science. The following contains a more complete description of the biblical cosmos, including your reference to Job 26:7.
According to Ecclesiastes 1:5 the sun actually goes around the earth--as, of course, it must, since, according to Ps 93:1, Ps 96:10, and 1 Chr 16:30, the earth does not move. And the earth cannot move because, according to 1 Samuel 2:8 and Ps 75:3, it is placed on pillars. And because it is placed on pillars, it has an underside and an upper side, as confirmed by Isaiah 40:22 which indicates that the earth is a flat disk.
(The Hebrew word translated as "circle" in Isaiah 40:22 is chuwg, which means "circle" not "sphere." Strong's Concordance: "circle"..."describe a circle." Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament: "Circle...the earth conceived as a disc, Is 40:22." Hebrew-Aramaic and English Lexicon of the Old Testament: "draw round, make a circle." If a sphere were meant, the Hebrew word duwr would have been used. The ancient Hebrews would have gotten the idea of a circular earth by viewing the horizon from the top of a mountain.)
Since the biblical earth is flat, it has an underside and under the earth is the abyss, which is referred to several times in the Bible. That is also what is being referred to in Job 26:7 when it says that the earth hangs over nothing. (The original Hebrew word translated as "upon" in that passage in the KJV also means "over.") The actual sphere of the earth in space is not "suspended' or "hanging" "over" or "upon" nothing. It is orbiting the sun at 66,700 miles per hour.
There are several other verses in the Bible indicating the earth is flat, such as Nebuchadnezzar's vision in Dan 4:10-11 (if it were not flat the tree could not be seen from all the earth), and Dan 2:28 states that the visions of Nebuchadnezzar are from God. If the biblical god says the biblical earth is flat, it must be flat.
The original Hebrew word translated as firmament is raqiya, which is a noun derived from the Hebrew word raqa. That word is a verb meaning "to beat out," and is used in the bible in reference to beating out metal into plates or expanses of the metal (as in Exodus 39:3). So raqiya, as a noun, would literally mean "that which is beaten out."
The idea is that the firmament, or sky, is a solid, beaten out expanse or vault set on the rim of the flat disk of the earth. This understanding is confirmed in Job 37:18, which states:
"Can you beat out the vault of the skies as he does,
hard as a mirror of cast metal?" (New English Bible. .)
There, the Hebrew word translated as "beat out" (or "spread out" in other versions) is, as noted above, raqa.
That idea is also implied in verses such as Deut 4:32:
"Ask now about the former days, long before your time, from the day God created man on the earth; ask from one end of the heavens to the other. Has anything so great as this ever happened, or has anything like it ever been heard of?" See also Ps 19:1-6, Isaiah 13:4-5, and Matt 24:31.
The "ends of heaven" would be the base of the vault of heaven where it rests on the rim of the disk of the earth.
Also, the stars in the biblical cosmos are just lights set in the firmament. As mere lights in the sky, they will fall to the earth in the Last Days (Matt 24:29), something that is ridiculous considering the actual stars are other suns and many times larger than the earth.
So, according to the Bible the earth is a flat, immovable disk, supported by pillars and covered with a solid vault of heaven, the rim of which is is resting on the perimeter of the disk of the earth, and the stars are just lights set in the vault of heaven.
That this is the correct view of the biblical cosmos is shown by the fact that it describes a structure with parts that are fully consistent with each other. That structural consistency indicates that it accurately represents the cosmos as conceived by the ancient Hebrews and as its writers incorporated that view in the Bible.
Since that cosmos is nothing like the actual cosmos, its creator is mythical, just as the cosmos he is supposed to have created is mythical.
Moreover, according to the Bible, earth is the centerpiece of creation, and in the Last Days the biblical god will destroy the earth and the heavens as part of his plan for mankind.
That is ridiculous considering that the difference between the size of the earth and the size of the universe is even greater than the difference between the size of a hydrogen atom and the size of the earth.
It is therefore the height of geocentric idiocy to think that the whole universe was created merely for the sake of the earth and its inhabitants. All of which goes to show that the Bible cannot be considered the word of God, and therefore the god of the Bible does not exist.
Answered By: Lighting the Way to Reality - 9/2/2012 |