Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Martin and George:

The LXX and especially Vulgate are too late to make a definitive statement
as to the meaning of a word that is used so seldom in Tanakh. Already the
LXX shows signs that on some terms the translators were merely guessing as
to the meaning of those terms.

As for KhWG חוג its one use in Job is best translated as sphere. The Isaiah
use could go either way. The last and third example in Proverbs seems to
favor “circle” but how much of that is more picturesque than literal?

Isn’t it a stretch to assume that the Biblical writers would accept ancient
Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and Canaanite cosmologies when the totality of
Tanakh was so much in opposition to those religions?

My conclusion: on the basis of this one term, one cannot prove that the
ancient Hebrews believed in a spherical earth, but at the same time we
cannot rule it out. At the same time, to insist that the ancient Hebrews
believed in a flat earth is medieval cosmology, violating good exegesis of
the text. War caused destruction destroyed much data which could possibly
answer this question.

One thing that favors that the ancient Hebrews believed in a spherical
earth is that such beliefs were not unknown in ancient times, and that the
Bible is the source of our modern understanding of science and the findings
that true science give us, (there are some religious beliefs that are often
called scientific, but because they cannot be shown using the scientific
method, they also cannot be scientific beliefs) so we cannot rule out that
the ancient Hebrews knew of the concept that the earth was a sphere. At
least, a spherical earth fits a modern understanding of the text better
than a discus flat earth. And the medieval cosmology, which you claim that
was also found in Canaanite, Egyptian and Mesopotamian cosmologies, is way
off when evaluated according to ancient Hebrew language usage.

Karl W. Randolph.

On Wed, Aug 22, 2012 at 7:53 AM, <bhebrew AT shields-online.net> wrote:

> It is also probably worth noting that neither the LXX nor the Vulgate
> translate these terms with words meaning "ball, sphere" even though such
> were available.
>
> This then also fits with what we know of ancient Egyptian, Mesopotamian,
> and Canaanite cosmologies. Against this background it certainly doesn't
> seem that Isaiah or Job are sufficiently unambiguous to compel someone
> holding such a view to believe the Earth was spherical and so any person in
> the ancient world hearing these words would simply assume that their
> flat-Earth (although possibly spherical cosmos) view was not being
> challenged.
>
> Martin Shields,
> Sydney, Australia.