Does scripture support a round earth

[revmwc]

In another post the statement was made that most people of Paul's time believed in a flat earth but does scripture teach the earth as round?

Isaiah 40:22It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:

The hebrew word Khoog is translated cirlcle here it could also be translated circuit or compass. Does this show God looking upon the earth from every vantage point which shows a round earth?

Job 26:7 He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
10He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.

He hung the earth upon noting does this imply a round sphere hung. Verse 10 says the waters were compassed with bounds. Does this also imply that the earth is a compass or cirlcel?

Proverbs 8:27 When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:

Again a compass is for a round earth isn't it?

Matthew 12:40For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Ephesians 4:9 (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?

Can a flat earth have a heart, lower parts or a center? Does this show yet Jesus saying there is a round earth?

Luke 17:34 I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left.
35 Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
36 Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left.

Mankind in bed sleeping and others working in the fields does this show a round earth? People on one side sleeping at night while the others working in the day in the fields?

These verse seem to support a round earth taught even in Paul's day. Or does it?

 

[glfredrick]

Scripture supports a round earth. More so, the entire concept that people widely held that the earth was flat is based on a fictional account of the travels of Columbus. Granted, some may have thought that down through the ages, but there is no basis for doing so, and even the ancients understood the curvature of the earth simply from observation of the horizon.

Here is an interesting article on the subject:

http://www.bede.org.uk/flatearth.htm

And another:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matt-j-rossano/starting-a-war-with-a-fla_b_707471.html

Wikipedia even has a page devoted to the "flat earth myth";

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_Flat_Earth

In 1828, Washington Irving's highly romanticised biography, A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus,[16] was published and mistaken by many for a scholarly work.[17] In Book III, Chapter II of this biography, Irving gave a largely fictional account of the meetings of a commission established by the Spanish sovereigns to examine Columbus's proposals. One of his more fanciful embellishments was a highly unlikely tale that the more ignorant and bigoted members on the commission had raised scriptural objections to Columbus's assertions that the Earth was spherical.[18]

But in reality, the issue in the 1490s was not the shape of the Earth, but its size, and the position of the east coast of Asia, as Irving in fact points out. Historical estimates from Ptolemy onwards placed the coast of Asia about 180° east of the Canary Islands.[19] Columbus adopted an earlier (and rejected) distance of 225°, added 28° (based on Marco Polo's travels), and then placed Japan another 30° further east. Starting from Cape St. Vincent in Portugal, Columbus made Eurasia stretch 283° to the east, leaving the Atlantic as only 77° wide. Since he planned to leave from the Canaries (9° further west), his trip to Japan would only have to cover 68° of longitude.[20]

Furthermore, Columbus mistakenly used a much shorter length for a degree (he substituted the shorter 1480 m Italian "mile" for the longer 2177 m Arabic "mile"), making his degree (and the circumference of the Earth) about 75% of what it really was.[21] The combined effect of these mistakes was that Columbus estimated the distance to Japan to be only about 5,000 km (or only to the eastern edge of the Caribbean) while the true figure is about 20,000 km. The Spanish scholars may not have known the exact distance to the east coast of Asia, but they certainly knew that it was significantly further than Columbus' projection; and this was the basis of the criticism in Spain and Portugal, whether academic or amongst mariners, of the proposed voyage.

The disputed point, therefore, was not the shape of the Earth, nor the idea that going west would eventually lead to Japan and China, but the ability of European ships to sail that far across open seas. The small ships of the day (Columbus' three ships varied between 20.5 and 23.5 m – or 67 to 77 feet – in length and carried about 90 men) simply could not carry enough food and water to reach Japan. In fact, the ships barely reached the eastern Caribbean islands. Already the crews were mutinous, not because of some fear of "sailing off the edge", but because they were running out of food and water with no chance of any new supplies within sailing distance. They were on the edge of starvation.[22] What saved Columbus, of course, was the unknown existence of the Americas precisely at the point he thought he would reach Japan. His ability to resupply with food and water from the Caribbean islands allowed him to return safely to Europe. Otherwise his crews would have died, and the ships foundered. The academics were right: it was not possible for a 1492 ship to sail west across open oceans directly to Japan; mariners would die long before their proposed arrival.

 

[InTheLight]

These verse seem to support a round earth taught even in Paul's day. Or does it?

Sorry, but no, they don't.

Isaiah 40:22It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:

The hebrew word Khoog is translated cirlcle here it could also be translated circuit or compass. Does this show God looking upon the earth from every vantage point which shows a round earth?

Circle is not a sphere. If you are going to take this verse literally to mean that the earth is a sphere because the Bible says 'circle' then you are also going to have to believe the Bible says that the heavens are a flat curtain. Are you prepared to do that?

Job 26:7 He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
10He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.

He hung the earth upon noting does this imply a round sphere hung. Verse 10 says the waters were compassed with bounds. Does this also imply that the earth is a compass or cirlcel?

"Hanging the earth upon nothing" is a direct rebuke of the pagan belief that the earth was supported on legs. There is no connotation of roundness in that verse. The word 'compass' in the KJV means a limit or boundary or it can mean a circular circuit. The WATER has boundaries; nothing in the verse about the earth being round.

Proverbs 8:27 When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:

Again a compass is for a round earth isn't it?

No, putting a compass on the face of the deep simply means that God created the shorelines and the distant horizons.

(This thread is a good argument against using the KJV because it is archaic.)

 

[revmwc]

Sorry, but no, they don't.



Circle is not a sphere. If you are going to take this verse literally to mean that the earth is a sphere because the Bible says 'circle' then you are also going to have to believe the Bible says that the heavens are a flat curtain. Are you prepared to do that?



"Hanging the earth upon nothing" is a direct rebuke of the pagan belief that the earth was supported on legs. There is no connotation of roundness in that verse. The word 'compass' in the KJV means a limit or boundary or it can mean a circular circuit. The WATER has boundaries; nothing in the verse about the earth being round.

Proverbs 8:27 When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:

Again a compass is for a round earth isn't it?

Understand the Hebrew vocabulary doesn't contain a word for sphere so the circle word is used. Since there is no word for sphere does circle imply it with the Hebrew language?

 

[InTheLight]

Understand the Hebrew vocabulary doesn't contain a word for sphere so the circle word is used. Since there is no word for sphere does circle imply it with the Hebrew language?

I don't think so. I ask again, are the heavens a flat curtain, as used in that passage?