Vortex

In Exodus 20:4, some things we aren't meant to make graven images or likenesses of are those "in the water under the earth." Exactly how (if at all; or at least uncynically) am I meant to interpret this?

blues runner

Aren't we supposedly forbidden to make likenesses or graven images of anything? Does it just mention "in the water under the earth" or is that specification among a list of other forbidden examples (the forests, deserts, cities)? If it stands alone, beats me.

blues runner

Wait a minute. Doesn't it mention "the sky above" as well as "the waters below"? If so, then that's only to emphasize the seriousness of the commandment - excluding the possibility of graven images available within the entirety of man's reality. Does it mention space? It's just a passage that tries to drive the message home as powerfully as possible. And, it's pretty crappy writing, just like the rest of the book.

Vortex

Well, the entire passage is:

"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth."

But that still doesn't explain what this water is. Unless, in those days, people thought all the water in rivers, oceans, etc., came up through the ground from vast storehouses (like those of snow and rain mentioned in Job). Which leads back to my OP question: DID they think that? Or something else — and what?

blues runner

Couldn't tell ya.

JD

Apikorus

The Hebrew mitachat laaretz, which literally means "below the earth," in this context simply means the oceans and rivers. The same construction is used in Deut 4:17-18, which echoes the prohibition from Exod 20:4, but in Deuteronomy the phrase reads tav'nit kal-dagah asher bamayim mitachat laaretz = "the likeness of any fish that is in the waters below the earth." Thus, a fish (dag(ah)) lives in the "waters below the earth."

Note the pattern here: no graven images of "beasts of the earth," of "birds that fly in the heavens," of "anything that creeps in the ground," and of "any fish from the waters below the earth."

The prohibition is repeated in Deut 5:8.

Diogenes the Cynic

It reflects the ancient middle eastern view of a three tiered universe. The earth was conceived as a flat, round disk mounted on "pillars" with water below, a solid dome for the sky and "heaven" above the sky.

So, yeah, like syntheus said, the autor is just being thorough and naming all three tiers of the universe in descending order, i.e...

Heaven
Earth
Water.

gravitybow

Like this:
http://www.edwardtbabinski.us/skepticism/universe.html

John Kesler

I think that Apikorus is correct that oceans and rivers were intended (as well as any other body of water thought to contain life). The reason that such bodies of water were considered to be "under" the earth, even though they are in fact on the surface of the earth, is that in the mind of the Israelites the earth was on a great body of water, and things like springs, rivers, etc. were where the water had burst through (just as digging a well eventually leads to water). See for example Genesis 7:11 which speaks of the "fountains of the great deep" bursting apart to contribute to the flooding of the world. Large bodies of water like oceans were seen as being around the earth (as well as below it).

Here is a good site which discusses the three-story universe.