shernren said:
[NIV translates the "firmament" of the KJVs as "expanse".] Note that the birds are not flying "above the earth
in the expanse of the sky", they are flying
across the expanse. The Hebrew word literally means flying "on the face of" the expanse.
So there we go. The expanse is outer space and the face of the expanse is the atmosphere. The birds fly across the face of the expanse i.e. across the atmosphere while the sun and stars are set in the expanse i.e. in outer space. No mention of multiple heavens here. Now to go look for that layer of ice ....
The NRSV translates the KJV "firmament" as "dome" and that is even more accurate than "expanse" for it says what it is an expanse of.
You are entirely right except for the reference to outer space. Outer space is a modern concept. Biblically the sun, moon and stars are indeed set in the firmament/expanse/dome/heaven, which over-arches and encloses the sub-lunar atmosphere. But that expanse was not thought of as empty space, but as a substance which filled space.
Here is the universe as it was thought to be for most of the history of the church -- over 1500 years.
This is what Greek philosophers like Aristotle and Ptolemy worked out and the Church accepted as a correct model of the universe all through the Middle Ages and into early modern times.
The earth is in the centre of course, represented by the four elements of earth, water, air and fire. And in circles around it are set the Moon, Venus, Mercury, Sun, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn--all the planets that can be seen without the use of the telescope which had not yet been invented.
Beside the word and symbol of Saturn is the Latin word "coelu" meaning "heavens" and the circles are numbered 1-7. The ring beyond Saturn contains the constellations of the zodiac and is labelled "octavium firmamentu" or "eighth firmament" and beyond that there is a ninth and tenth heaven, with the tenth labelled "Primum mobile" or "First Mover". And outside the whole construction is the "Coelum Empirium Habitaculum Dei et Omnium Electorum" The Empyrian Heaven, the Habitation of God and All the Elect.
Now, in this vision of the cosmos those circles do not represent divisions of outer space. They represent immense hollow spheres made of the purest translucent crystal, one set inside the other from the Primum Mobile down to the Moon. According to the thinking of the time "Nature abhors a vaccum" and so every cranny of space in the universe is filled with something material until you get to God's heaven.
The Primum Mobile is so called, because it is the source of motion. Because we understand planets to orbit the sun, it is easy to think our ancestors thought of planets orbiting the earth in the same way. But they didn't. They did not think planets or the sun and moon moved at all. They only seemed to move because the hollow crystal spheres in which they were embedded revolved around the earth. And all the inner spheres took their motion from the Primum Mobile. And as they move, they vibrate and they make music. That is what the phrase "music of the spheres" refers to--the music made as these crystal spheres revolve.
Interestingly, this model, used by the church for over 1500 years, is still more modern than the biblical one, which sees at most three (not nine or ten) heavens, and is more compatible with a flat than a spherical earth. Some early Christians considered this to be a pagan model of the cosmos and opposed its acceptance by the Church. Whether they were right or not, neither the earlier biblical model, nor this model, had any place for outer space in it.
To the biblical writers and to theologians and scientists right up to 400 years ago, a firmament which took the form of a solid dome above the atmosphere was not a metaphor. It was what they believed literally existed.
Outer space is a thoroughly modern, post-Copernican idea, and cannot be read even metaphorically into the text of the bible.
