yeshuasavedme posted in message #62 of this thread:
Hi Bible2.
Hi.
yeshuasavedme posted in message #62 of this thread:
I posted many Scriptures on this thread which do show that God has
set His temple in the sun
Note that none of the scriptures which have been posted actually
say or require in the original Hebrew that God has set his temple in
the sun. This is probably because he hasn't, but has set his temple
high above the sun and all of the other trillions of little stars in outer
space (the second heaven). God has most likely set his temple in
the third heaven spiritual realm: "I was in the spirit: and, behold, a
throne was set in heaven" (Revelation 4:2); "caught up to the third
heaven" (2 Corinthians 12:2).
yeshuasavedme posted in message #62 of this thread:
-as the Septuagint translates it in Psalm 18: "in the sun hath He set
His tabernacle".
Note that we shouldn't go by any fallible translation of humans in
determining the meaning of God's own Word in the Old Testament,
but should look only to the original, divinely-inspired Hebrew. And
nothing in the Hebrew of Psalms 19:4, or in the context of the verse,
requires that God has set his temple in the sun. Instead, the context
of the verse makes clear that it is talking about God only
figuratively
setting in the sky (the first heaven) a tabernacle (tent)
for the sun:
"The heavens [the sky] declare the glory of God; and the firmament
[the atmosphere] sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth
speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. There is no speech
nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out
through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In
them [them being the sky and atmosphere, from the viewpoint of
people on earth] hath he set a tabernacle for the sun, Which [sun]
is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a
strong man to run a race [across the sky during the day]. His [the
sun's] going forth is from the end of the heaven [the place of
sunrise], and his circuit unto the ends of it [the place of sunset]:
and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof [the heat of the sun]"
(Psalms 19:1-6). So Psalms 19:1-6 is just poetically expressing the
glory of God's creation, especially the sun, as it is seen in the sky by
people on the earth.
One of the dangers of telling people that God's temple is in the sun,
is that it could cause them to revere the sun as if it were the place
of God Himself, so that when they saw the sun they could sin by
basically worshipping it in their heart like some pagan. Compare:
"lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the
sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven,
shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the
LORD thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven"
(Deuteronomy 4:19). Instead of the sun being some extra-holy
thing we should revere as the actual place where God lives, it is
just a ball of burning gas, a lightbulb for the earth during the day,
just as the moon is only a ball of dirt, a nightlight for the earth:
"And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light
upon the earth" (Genesis 1:17).
That's all they are, nothing more, just as all the trillions of other
stars in the universe besides the sun are just other balls of burning
gas, but so far away that they appear as little pinpricks of light to
people on the earth. As Creator of the entire universe, God sits
enthroned above it all, not in just one tiny little ball of gas floating
around the outer perimeter of just one tiny little galaxy, out of 100
billion other galaxies in the universe. Modern astronomy has opened
up the vastness of the universe to us in a way that glorifies God as
its Creator infinitely more than the old pagan ignorance of thinking
that our little pinprick sun is the biggest and most important thing in
the universe, and that the sun is at the center of everything.
yeshuasavedme posted in message #62 of this thread:
That is what the text was understood to say by the ancients who
studied to learn.
ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus |
Christian Classics Ethereal Library
ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus
Their voice has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the
ends of the world. In the sun hath He set His tabernacle,
Actually, one would have to show that all of "the ancients" of the
church thought that God's temple was in the sun, and that their
thinking hadn't been corrupted by a fallible translation of Psalms 19:4,
and that the original infallible Hebrew actually says or requires that
God's temple is in the sun. Otherwise, what we must do is be good
Bereans and "search the scriptures" themselves, for ourselves, to
see if what some person has said is actually "so" (Acts 17:11). So
far, with every verse that has been posted, every time the original
Hebrew has been looked at, it has been found that no verse says or
requires that God has set his temple in the sun, instead of in the
third heaven spiritual realm, high
above the entire universe:
"If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in
brightness; And my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth
hath kissed my hand: This also were an iniquity to be punished by
the judge: for I should have denied the God that is
above"
(Job 31:26-28).
