How Can We Be So Stupid?, Part II

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September 25, 2006

I wrote a column for Strike The Root the other day called How Can We Be So Stupid?, an article that makes the point that it's wrong to tolerate ignorance just because it's under the cloak of the 'revealed' religions. The next day I received an email regarding the column that asked for the Bible quote that said the Earth is the center of the universe. Checking for that particular quote, I soon realized that the Bible did not actually say it was the center of the universe. What I found instead paints the Bible in an even darker light.

The reason I was thinking the Bible actually said the Earth is the center of the universe is because the Catholic Church burned Giordano Bruno alive for denying the geocentric teachings of the Church, among other disagreements with Christian dogma. The Church was also going to burn Galileo alive for denying the Earth is the center of the universe, but he recanted and said that the Church's geocentric teachings were correct. Because he said the Church was right and reality was wrong, the Inquisition gave him house arrest for the rest of his life.

While looking for the Bible quote that says the Earth is the center of the universe, I found that the Bible writers were so ignorant of nature and science that they thought the Earth was actually flat! To their thinking (not God's), everything is hierarchical. They thought the universe was in layers, one above the other with the Earth being on the bottom. In Genesis 1:6-8 we find, 'And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

'1:7 And God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

'1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.'

According to the above Bible quote, God made the firmament/Heaven above the Earth. This way he could focus on the center of his attention, the Jews. Also, the Bible god put Heaven right above Earth so he could keep a good eye on us and make sure we didn't try to build a tower that could reach all the way up to Heaven! (I don't mean to Babel! LOL!)

A key Bible verse that demonstrates the Bible writers believed the Earth was flat is Matthew 4:8, which deals with the Devil tempting Jesus. It reads, 'Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;' The only way this would be possible is if the Earth was flat.

The Bible makes many references that could only be true is the Earth was flat. A couple of them are Revelation 1:7, which says everyone on Earth will see Jesus when he returns and Daniel 4:10-11, which says there is a tree so tall that it 'was visible to the whole Earth.' Both of these far-fetched tales require a flat Earth to be true.

I can understand how someone like George Bush could believe nonsense like this. Why is it then that we either continue to go against our God-given reason and actually believe these ludicrous unreasonable myths, or don't point them out to those who are being misled to believe them?