Freethought & Rationalism Archive

John A. Broussard · 04-04-2005, 01:19 PM

This is my third attempt to get an answer to this question. What happens each time is that the discussion goes off into incomprehensibility. Maybe that's where it belongs, but I'm going to try once more. Here are the biblical statements:

12 Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, "O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon."

13 So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, Until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar? And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day.

14 There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel.

Here's the question:

So "the sun stood still." Now, did it? If not, how do those who believe in the inerrancy of the bible explain what happened?

Hydra009 · 04-04-2005, 01:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by John A. Broussard

So "the sun stood still." Now, did it?

No.

Quote:

If not, how do those who believe in the inerrancy of the bible explain what happened?

They could try to explain it a number of different ways, but what does it matter what they say?

John A. Broussard · 04-04-2005, 01:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hydra009

No.

They could try to explain it a number of different ways

Any idea what those ways might be?

Anat · 04-04-2005, 02:00 PM

Well, that depends on what the person believes wrt miracles. In principle, one could claim that God can stop earth's rotation and take care of all the colateral damage (ie stop the hurricanes, micromanage effects on plant life, etc) - the only problem would be lack of records of extra long day or night (depending on location) in other places. Alternatively, one can say that God created an illusion of an extra-long day locally, and later returned things to normal, so that the calendar would be compatible with that of neighboring countries.

LeeBuhrul · 04-04-2005, 02:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by John A. Broussard

This is my third attempt to get an answer to this question. What happens each time is that the discussion goes off into incomprehensibility. Maybe that's where it belongs, but I'm going to try once more. Here are the biblical statements:

12 Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, "O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon."

13 So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, Until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar? And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day.

14 There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel.

Here's the question:

So "the sun stood still." Now, did it? If not, how do those who believe in the inerrancy of the bible explain what happened?

the earth stood still?

Wait that's another work of fiction... never mind

Toto · 04-04-2005, 02:06 PM

Christian Think Tank (warning - slow loading page) discusses this miracle.

Quote:

This is admittedly one of the stranger sounding stories in the bible. But our problem here first is to understand exactly what happened. The exegesis of this passage is VERY complex, because even 'traditional' commentators have trouble with the ambiguity in the account. The main choices (among those "conservatives" who accept miraculous elements by God) are:
Extension of daylight hours (allowing the battle to continue) [Woudstra in NICOT]

Subjective 'extension' of daylight hours (more an miracle of 'efficiency' than 'nature') [possible conclusion of Keil and Delitzsch]
Semi-Darkness during the day due to miraculous hailstorms and cloud covering (maximizing confusion, reducing heat, and divine deliverance) [Madvig in EBC, Walt Kaiser]
Providential battle play-out (the sun always being in the opponents' eyes due to the slope of the enemy's descent) [Gordon]
An eclipse (as an omen, based on ANE usage of the verbs) [R.D. Wilson, Holliday]

The exegetical problems stem from four main factors:

The mixture of poetic and narrative elements
The mixture of summary statements and detailed event descriptions
The ambiguity in the word choices describing the astronomical/meteorological events
The historical setting and the general inability of anyone present to measure time or observe the sun.

In other words, it could have been a natural phenomenon observed as an extension of the day, or God could have messed with their minds.

LeeBuhrul · 04-04-2005, 02:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hydra009

No.

They could try to explain it a number of different ways, but what does it matter what they say?

yes... it did...as it always does...sort of... relative to the earth... but i digress...

(mumbling on the way back for a refill)

Toto · 04-04-2005, 02:14 PM

Answers in Genesis - Johsua's long day has 3 possible solutions (AIG does have the integrity to reject the email hoax about NASA discovering a missing day).

Quote:

1. Some form of refraction (bending) of the light from the sun and the moon. According to this view, God miraculously caused the sunlight and moonlight to continue in Canaan for ‘about a whole day’.

. . .

2. A wobble in the direction of the Earth’s axis of rotation.

This involves a precession[8] of the axis of the Earth, wobbling slowly so as to trace an ‘s’-shaped or circular path in the sky. Such an event could have made it appear to an observer that the sun and the moon were standing still, but need not have involved any actual slowing of the rotation of the Earth.

. . .

3. A slowing of the Earth’s rotation.

According to this view, God caused the rotation of the Earth to slow down so that it made one full revolution in about 48 hours rather than 24. Simultaneously God stopped the cataclysmic effects that would have naturally occurred, such as monstrous tidal waves. Some people have objected to this on the erroneous assumption that, if the Earth slowed down, people and loose objects would fly off into space. In fact, the apparent centrifugal force (tending to throw things off the Earth) is only about one-three-hundredth of the gravitational force. If the Earth stopped rotating (whether suddenly or not), this outward ‘force’ would cease and we would actually be held more firmly by gravity.

The Earth at the equator moves at about 1,600 km/h (1,000 mph). The velocity needed to escape from the Earth’s gravity is about 40,000 km/h (25,000 mph). If the Earth was spinning as fast as this, we would all fly off into space anyway, regardless of whether the Earth stopped suddenly or not!

ninewands · 04-04-2005, 02:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by John A. Broussard

Any idea what those ways might be?

Mass hallucination is the only one I can think of.

The estimated average radius of the earth is 6371 km ... or approximately 3900 miles. Taking the average latitude for Canaan to be insignificantly different from that of modern day Israel (approx. 32 degrees N), the rotational velocity of the earth's surface is approximately 1414 km/hour at Gibeon. The earth rotates from west to east, so an instantaneous stop from that speed would have probably landed Joshua on the East side of the Jordan, at least ... if the winds and tsunamis didn't keep him bouncing along for some additional distance, say across Jordan all the way to present-day Saudi Arabia.

Considering the mass of the earth (estimated at approximately 6*10^21 metric tons), I don't even want to THINK about the energy that would be released by such an event. I expect that it would have heated the atmosphere and flash-boiled enough of the oceans such that no living creature would have survived.

LeeBuhrul · 04-04-2005, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Answers in Genesis - Johsua's long day has 3 possible solutions (AIG does have the integrity to reject the email hoax about NASA discovering a missing day).

it says the SUN stopped... not the EARTH...

04-04-2005, 01:19 PM	#1
John A. Broussard Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Hawaii Posts: 6,629	Joshua stopping the sun This is my third attempt to get an answer to this question. What happens each time is that the discussion goes off into incomprehensibility. Maybe that's where it belongs, but I'm going to try once more. Here are the biblical statements: 12 Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, "O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon." 13 So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, Until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar? And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day. 14 There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel. Here's the question: So "the sun stood still." Now, did it? If not, how do those who believe in the inerrancy of the bible explain what happened?

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04-04-2005, 02:00 PM	#4
Anat Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: home Posts: 3,715	Well, that depends on what the person believes wrt miracles. In principle, one could claim that God can stop earth's rotation and take care of all the colateral damage (ie stop the hurricanes, micromanage effects on plant life, etc) - the only problem would be lack of records of extra long day or night (depending on location) in other places. Alternatively, one can say that God created an illusion of an extra-long day locally, and later returned things to normal, so that the calendar would be compatible with that of neighboring countries.

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