Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Sauron · 12-26-2002, 12:25 PM

Discussion started over in the BC&A forum, before the migration:

Quote:

Originally posted by devnet:
Turkel aka Holding wrote an article explaining how the raqia' or "firmament" of Gen 1 may not necessarily mean a solid dome, here:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/4169.asp

To that, I wrote a refutation:

http://www.geocities.com/stmetanat/raqiasolid-01.htm

I've sent Holding an e-mail notification of this refutation. Let's see what he'll do with it.

-- Shlomi Tal aka devnet (no, my real name ain't supposed to be secret )

Hi Shlomi,

I can't access your refutation on geocities.com. Was it moved?

n.b. - one would think that Turkel would have more self-respect than to let himself be published by the likes of Ken Ham.

ShottleBop · 12-26-2002, 08:34 PM

According to Richard Elliott Friedman, in his new translation of the Torah:

Quote:

The "firmament" is either the entire air space or, more probably, just the transparent edge of the space, like a glass dome (Ramban says "like a tent"), which is actually up against the water. It is difficult to say which. The Hebrew root of the word, [raish koof yud ayin], refers to the way in which a goldsmith hammers gold leaf very thin. This may suggest that the firmament is best understood to be the thin outermost layer of the air space. Still, we must be cautious not to commit the etymological fallacy. That means: we should not automatically derive the meaning of a word from its root. People commonly make this mistake because the Hebrew of the Tanakh is so beautifully constructed around three-letter roots. Looking for root meanings is usually very helpful. But sometimes it can lead to misunderstandings. Words can evolve away from their root meanings over centuries.

emotional · 12-27-2002, 01:54 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Sauron
I can't access your refutation on geocities.com. Was it moved?

Turkel found a fatal error in it, namely, I had written that a particular Hebrew word for denoting an open expanse would be suitable for use in the Bible, but I hadn't checked if that word appeared at all in the Bible. Obviously I couldn't let the article be presented to all with such a flaw, so I had to delete it. I may rewrite it in the future, but there's no guarantee.

I've been told that debating Turkel is somewhat of a fruitless job and that he's not worth debating at all. I don't know if that's a valid objection for debating him, but in the meantime I'll put the subject on holding (pun intended).

Quote:

n.b. - one would think that Turkel would have more self-respect than to let himself be published by the likes of Ken Ham.

Actually it's not surprising. He's a young-earth creationist, and he usually refers critics to Answers in Genesis when they mention evolution to him.

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