I’ve seen a few posts where people have said that the Bible states the earth is flat and/or the centre of the universe.
To which part of the Bible are they referring?
Here’s my favorite rundown of biblical passages that can be taken to imply a flat earth:
http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/febible.htm
IMHO, the least ambiguous passages, which are hardest to be dismissed as poetic, are Daniel 4:10-11, describing a tree tall enough to be seen from anywhere on Earth, and Matthew 4:8 where Satan takes Jesus to the top of a mountain from which all the nations of the Earth . . . though I’ve seen that one dismissed by saying that the author only meant the kingdoms in the known world.
Actually the passage in Daniel 4:10-11 refers to a tree in a dream–not an actual tree that is said to have existed.
No one claimed the tree actually existed. But it’s certainly evidence that at least some people at the time were under the impression that all the earth could be seen from a great enough height. (I’ve never considered Daniel 4 a reasonable argument in favor of a flat earth, myself. There are many better.)
It doesn’t specifically say anywhere in the bible that the Earth is the center of the universe. It is merely something that became part of church doctrine. Augustine and Acquinine wrote thousands of pages interpolating and extracting from the bible, and these things became church doctrine. It only seemed logical to them at the time. If god made the heavens and the earth, and then chose to put life on our little planet, we must then be the center of everything. They could SEE the sun move around us…they could see the stars moving in the night sky. Of course the things must be moving around us. If we were moving, we would be able to feel it, right? It was a perfectly logical thing to believe.
Of course if you want to get technical, it could be pointed out that the Earth is at the centre of the universe.
But that would be cheap weasling.
pan
The tree thing is interesting, but there’s a tree (singular) in revelation that grows on both sides of a river, so I think a literal view of either is going to be tricky…
and yes, the earth is at the centre of the universe, but so is everything else. (I take it you’re talking about the space=balloon analogy?)
… which is the same as saying that London is in the centre of a map of the earth’s surface; it can be, if you like.
So, let’s hear 'em, Mr. Snooty Pants. (I’m I allowed to call people Mr. Snooty Pants in GD?)
Not only is the Earth flat in the Bible, it’s square (or at least quadrilateral):
“After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land or on the sea or on any tree.”
– Revelation 7:1 (NIV translation) [emphasis mine]
“But wait!” I hear you say. “The term ‘four corners of the Earth’ is just a metaphor!” Bah! You know as well as I do that the slippery slope of interpreting a biblical passage as “metaphor” always leads to SATAN! If you believe the Earth doesn’t have 4 literal corners, next you’ll start to believe that Genesis shouldn’t be interpreted literally and that the Earth is more than 6000 years old, and then you’ll be selling your daughters into sexual slavery and saying the Pledge of Allegiance without the “under God” part in it. And then what kind of a Fundamentalist would you be?!
Of course you are, AFAIC. But I’m certainly sorry you feel the need to.
Tracer, I asked the question in the OP because I was interested in the answer, not so that you could hijack it and turn it into the usual tired anti-fundie tirade.
Sorry, but can we keep on topic here?
Then perhaps GQ would have been a more appropriate forum for this line of inquiry?
one post ridiculing a patently ridiculous proposition (the Earth is flat, and also has four corners!) qualifies as a tirade? um, OK.
tracer’s post seems quite on-topic to me. What’s the problem?
I do kind of have to agree. Tracer’s post was a bit extreme, considering the fact that no fundie thumpers have yet reared their ugly heads. I find his remarks amusing…but save them for the fundies. 
Hell, lighten up. I was just joking–please excuse the omission of the smilie. I’m still interested in hearing the passages you think are better.
S’ok, Tracer. I thought it was funny. Not sure why people wanted to take that seriously.
Pod, I think we just whooshed the hell out of each other. I realized you intended no offense, but you didn’t realize that I realized it, and . . .
Anyhoo . . . the four corners argument is supportable, in Revelation as well as Isiah 11:12. My favorites, though, are I Sam. 2:8 (“the Pillars of the Earth”), and Job 37:3 (“ends of the earth”).
And of course, Galileo Galilei was convicted of heresy on the basis of Joshua 10:12, 1 Chronicles 16:30, Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, and Psalm 104:5, all of which assert that the Earth doesn’t move or rotate.
Look, Mangetout, those are the arguments. The idea is simply to point out that Biblical literalism is untenable. Non-Christians really don’t believe that all fundamentalists are flatearthers. Really.
Whew, okay, that’s what I hoped was going on.
The “pillars” passages have in the past been used to bolster (if you’ll forgive my choice of words) some odd ideas about the Earth’s interior–that it’s hollow, and whatnot. I can’t find any cites at the moment, but I’m pretty sure there are some pillar-supported cosmolgies mentioned in Gardner’s Fads and Fallacies.
I also read somewhere (might even have been at the SDMB) that to the medival mind, the Earth being at the center wasn’t necessarily indicative of its being special, the pinnacle of creation, etc. The center was where all the baser stuff falls to, and collects. Galileo and his ilk were out to elevate the Earth to the status of heavenly body–elevating it, in a sense, above the Sun.
erm, this:
Sorry if I overreacted up there, what I mean is that I would like it very much if this thread could refrain from descending into the usual PI=3, Evolution/creation type of pointless verbal tennis.
The Bible DOES indicate that the Earth is the center of the Universe, and that the sun revolves around it. Hence, it is asserted that “the sun stood still” for Joshua.
On the other hand, there has NEVER been a church doctrine that the Earth is flat. Numerous church fathers (including Augustine and Aquinas) allude to the earth’s roundness. They got the shape of the solar system wrong, but NOT the shape of the Earth.
The notion that Christians believed in a flat Earth was popularized by Washington Irving, in a snide attempt at humor.