Dr. Jason Lisle
[Originally published as the first section of Untwisting Scripture: Refuting Flat Earth Falsehoods – Part 5]
In this series of articles, we’ve been addressing the most common prooftexts that FSIPs (Flat/Stationary Interpretation Proponents) cite to justify their allegation that the Bible depicts, indicates, or implies a flat and/or stationary earth. Genesis 1 is a passage frequently cited among these many prooftexts. I recommend you read the chapter before continuing.
Now, most of you are probably wondering what in the world this passage has to do with the shape of the earth. Indeed, anyone simply reading these verses in their context without a preset agenda would never link the idea of a flat or stationary earth with these verses. The very fact that I need to explain how the FSIPs infer this concept from these verses ought to speak volumes.
FSIPs usually appeal to two concepts contained within this passage: 1) the earth having a “face” and 2) the word “firmament,” which is used in the KJV, NKJV, ASV, and Geneva translations. According to FSIPs, the earth has a face like a clock has a face. Therefore, since a clock is round and flat, the earth must be round and flat. Additionally, they believe that the firmament is a firm or solid dome that covers a flat, circular earth, like the dome of a snow globe.
Is this really what Moses was intending to communicate in Genesis? Is this what any of the biblical authors were endeavoring to depict, suggest, or portray in their writings? Or is this yet another example of the FSIPs imposing their preexisting cosmological ideas onto the text to justify their cosmological beliefs? Let’s once again examine the text in context to see if there’s any validity to these claims.
The Face of the Earth
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. (Genesis 1:2)
“And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit.” (Gen 1:29)
Genesis isn’t the only book of the Bible that speaks of the earth having a “face.” All told, the phrase “the face of the earth” (pā·ně hā ā’·rěṣ) appears more than twenty times in fourteen different books.
The Hebrew term pā·ně occurs ~1940 times in Scripture, with more than 350 of those being translated as “face.” Many of these instances are meant figuratively, like “he fell on his face,” seeing God “face to face,” and “seek my face.”
You have said, “Seek my face.”
My heart says to you,
“Your face, Lord, I do seek.”
Hide not your face from me. (Ps 27:8-9a)Advertisement Below:
It’s also used literally in many places. Yet, pā·ně is never used (either figuratively or literally) in reference to a clock or any other kind of timekeeping device like a sundial.
The most common sense in which “face” is intended is of a human face.
Israel said to Joseph, “Now let me die, since I have seen your face and know
that you are still alive.” (Genesis 46:30)
“When Moses came down from Mount Sinai… the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. Aaron and all the people of Israel saw Moses, and behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him… And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face.” (Exodus 34:29–33)
Keep in mind that human faces are on human heads, and human heads are not “flat like a clock.” Rather, a human head is shaped more like an oblate spheroid. So, if we’re to follow the FSIPs’ reasoning, we should really conclude that since the earth has a face like a human head has a face … the earth must be an oblate spheroid!
But, of course, such reasoning is fallacious, as is their entire line of argumentation.
Anyone not trying to impose their cosmological views on the text naturally understands that face means surface in these passages in Genesis and elsewhere. The two words are synonymous. As a matter of fact, they’re the same word in Hebrew.
That’s why pā·ně is also rendered as “surface” in these translations.
Behold, the Lord will empty the earth and make it desolate,
and he will twist its surface (pā·ně )and scatter its inhabitants. (Isaiah 24:1)
“He who made the Pleiades and Orion,
and turns deep darkness into the morning
and darkens the day into night,
who calls for the waters of the sea
and pours them out on the surface of the earth (pā·ně hā ā’·rěṣ),
the Lord is his name;” (Amos 5:8).
This is why many English translations render pā·ně as “surface” in Genesis 1. For example, the NASB1995 reads:
The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters… (v. 1)
Then God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth.” (v. 29)
And in Ezekiel we read:
“My flock was scattered over all the surface of the earth, and there was no one to search or seek for them.” (Ezekiel 34.6)
Now, all three-dimensional objects have surfaces, regardless of their shape. Both a hockey puck and a basketball have a surface. Both my desk and the globe on my desk have a surface or face. The surface of an object is simply the external or outward facing side of an object. Hence the synonym face.
Anyone not trying to impose their cosmological presuppositions on the text understands that the passage is in no way attempting to depict or communicate what the shape of the earth is by using the word “face.”
Once again, the FSIP-cited passages that supposedly depict a flat earth have absolutely nothing to do with the shape of the earth.
