Ryan Goodwin

Introduction

          “If there is a God who is supreme over our universe, and if the Bible is the revelation from that God, then there is one essential that must be inherent within that revelation. It must be constituted solely of truths. It is an absolute necessity then, that statements of Bible writers, when describing or mentioning physical laws of this universe, other than allowances for poetic license, must coincide perfectly with all known facts of science (not necessarily theories). Furthermore, they must do this regardless of the accepted theories and level of scientific knowledge of the age in which they were written” (Has God Spoken?, Schnabel, ii). One of the most potent arguments in favor of a genuine Bible is the fact that it describes and enumerates scientific facts like no other book in history. In some ways, the scriptures perform literary tasks that most science textbooks cannot, clarifying geological, biological, astronomical, and hydrological truths that even the leading minds of the day did not comprehend.

          And should this come as a surprise to those of us who have spent a lifetime studying God’s book? After all, it is the Almighty who created this universe and who authored the Bible. It only makes sense that the Creator knows best His own creation – much to the chagrin of scientists throughout the ages who have had to amend and revise their theories to accommodate new discoveries.

          What makes the Bible such a thrilling book is that it is smarter, wittier, funnier, and more accurate than anything man has ever produced on his own. We see scientific allusions in the Bible that would have been laughed at in the age they were written. There are truths in the Bible – commonly accepted by our contemporaries – that even the leading minds of Moses’ day would have scoffed at. It is hard to imagine how foolish the Bible writers must have seemed to the alchemists, astrologers, and magicians of their time.

          Let us examine some of the scientific allusions in the Bible. While there are many, time allows us only to dwell on some of the most significant of the lot.

Astronomy – The Earth Is Spherical

          What is now very common knowledge was once a joke to many. But before Greek astronomers made strides in the study of our universe, Bible writers were being inspired by God to note the spherical shape of our planet. “He inscribed a circle on the face of the deep” (Proverbs 8:27). Also note Isaiah 40:22, “It is He that sits above the circle of the earth.” Solomon wrote his proverb in around 1000 B.C. and Isaiah was inspired somewhere between 745 ands 695 B.C. The Hebrew word “Khug” is translated “circle” but is more precisely described as “sphere” or “roundness.” So in both instances, under the ocean and on dry land, the shape of our planet is spherical. This completely contradicts the ancient idea that the world is a flat disk. In the fourth century B.C., Greek scientists, such as Aristotle, did conclude that the world was round, but the Romans dispelled that idea when they became the predominant people of the world. Their idea that the earth is a disk became the standard for 13 centuries until Magellan, Columbus, and other early explorers came to the right conclusion.

The Earth Revolves Daily

          “Have you ever in your life commanded the morning, and caused the dawn to know its place… it is changed like clay under the seal” (Job 38:12-14). Interestingly, there is a powerful truth in these seemingly poetic words. The Hebrew word “changed” in Job 38:14 carries the meaning “changed by turning”. “’Seals’ were commonly used as signature rings in ancient days. Today’s museums show they generally were constructed of an engraved round semiprecious stone mounted on a ring. The engraved stone, called a signate, would be pressed into damp clay, then the clay turned to make an impression of concentric circles… Job paralleled the break-of-day to the impression left by the signate ring in the clay… God’s instruction to Job is: The ring (sun) which makes the impression (daybreak) is held in a fixed position and the clay (earth) which receives the impression (daybreak) is rotated completely around so that the ring (sun) appears in its original position once again” (Schnabel, 4). Thus, the conclusion is that even though the sun appears to be moving around the world day after day, it is actually the earth that rotates while the sun is stationary. This truth was not discovered until 1543, by a man named Nicolaus Copernicus. “The system proposed by Copernicus required such a reversal of all current scientific and religious thought as to man’s place in the physical universe that violent opposition arose and even learned men were slow to accept its possibility” (“Copernican System”, Encyclopedia Americana, Olivier, Vol. 7, 1957 ed., p. 649).

The Earth Is Not Supported

          As a matter of clear science, Job writes in Job 26:7, “He… hangs the earth on nothing.” This was written, possibly, around 2000 B.C., but it was not until 1543 A.D. that the archaic Ptolemy system was defeated with the invention of the telescope. Until then, most scholars believed that the earth was rigidly supported in the universe by a structure of some kind and that all movement circulated around our planet.

Oceanography – Recesses of the Deep

          Numerous verses make it clear that there are vast recesses found in the ocean. Some of these trenches go so deep that they can only be explored with machines. We know almost nothing about these ocean canyons, and the life that manages to survive there is some of the most fascinating in the world. Job wrote, “Have you ever walked in the recesses of the deep?” (Job 38:16). A thousand years later, David speaks of these in 2 Samuel 22:16, “The channels of the sea appeared, the foundations of the world were laid bare.” The channels described here are literally canyons or crevasses in the ocean. Until relatively recent times, the common assumption was that the oceans were vast, flat sandy beds similar to dry deserts. The mid-nineteenth century A.D. was really the first time mankind began discovering deep ocean trenches using sounding devices as simple as a hemp line with a weight on one end. Echo-sounding equipment was invented in 1911 by Reginald Fessenden. It was used to measure ocean depths by sending out a sound and measuring the amount of time it took for it to echo back. Echo-sounding discovered one trench after another, revealing that the ocean floor is surprisingly more dynamic and varied than dry land surfaces. The deepest trench is in the Marianas at more than seven miles deep. The Tonga Trench is a mile deeper than Mt. Everest is high, and the Peru-Chile Trench has one wall that rises over 42,000 feet. They make the Grand Canyon look miniature in comparison.

Springs In the Ocean

          “Have you entered into the springs of the sea?” asks Job 38:16. Moses, around the second half of the fifteenth century B.C., wrote in Genesis 7:11 and 8:2, “All the fountains of the great deep burst open,” “the fountains of the deep… were closed.” Also consider Proverbs 8:28. When all of these verses are considered, it seems that the Bible writers were inspired to know that underwater springs existed on the ocean floor. This was completely unheard of in the scientific community for ages until the twentieth century A.D., when strange sources of fresh water were found to be emanating from somewhere in the ocean. It was not until 1945, when Oceanography research ships plied the seas after World War II, that underwater volcanoes were discovered. There are probably more than 10,000 such volcanoes dotting the floor of the Pacific Ocean alone. Dr. William Rubey of the U.S. Geological Survey has shown that the present rate of water release from underwater volcanoes, fumaroles, and hot springs releases 430 million tons per years (Exploring the Secrets of the Sea, Cromie, p. 15). The earths heat drives the entrapped water from underground molten rock and forces it out through one of the thousands of natural openings.

Ocean Currents

          We are told in Psalm 8:8 that God has subjected all things to men, including “Whatever passes through the paths of the sea.” David knew by inspiration that there were paths in the ocean waters. The word “paths” carries the literal meaning of “customary roads.” These currents are used constantly today in sea travel, as well as charting the paths of fish and other sea creatures. It was not until 1855 A.D. that mankind discovered this fact on its own. “Matthew Fontaine Maury is called ‘The Pathfinder of the Seas.’ This American is the father of today’s oceanography and responsible for establishing the Annapolis Academy… Until Maury’s efforts there were no charts or sailing lanes. One day during a temporary illness, his eldest son was reading to him from the Bible, and read Psalm 8:8. Maury stopped him and said, ‘read it again.’ After hearing it again, he exclaimed, ‘It is enough, if the word of God says there are paths in the sea, they must be there, and I am going to find them.’ Within a few years he had charted sea lanes and currents. His ‘Physical Geography of the Sea’ was the first textbook of modern oceanography” (Schnabel, 38). Since then, commercial fishermen have learned that schools of fish frequently use these “paths of the sea” in search of food.

Water-Vapor Cycle

          One of the more astounding descriptions of a natural phenomenon in the Bible is in Ecclesiastes 1:6-7, which says, “Blowing toward the south, then turning toward the north, the wind continues swirling along; and on its circular courses the wind returns. All the rivers flow into the sea, yet the sea is not full. To the place where the rivers flow, there they flow again.” Two things are described here in perfect detail. First, the wind is on “courses” which literally means it follows a set pattern. We see this as an observable fact in the world – the same winds come in and out at different times of the year. We can predict with great accuracy when hurricane season is upon us, when strong Gorge winds are imminent, what the traditional trade winds are that ships have been using for commerce for centuries. Second, the water-vapor cycle is discussed by the writer. Job 36:27-28 confirms this, saying, “For He draws up the drops of water, they distil rain from the midst, which the clouds pour down, they drip on man abundantly.” The Hebrew word for “distil” literally means to have small moisture droplets of steam or vapor condense and collect into water drops large enough to become heavy and fall. The fact is that the Bible writers recognized the basic mechanics of the water-vapor cycle. The rivers empty into the sea from higher ground. Drops of water are drawn up as vapor, forming clouds. These clouds are carried by the wind to various places on the earth, where rain is deposited. When the river empties into the sea, it returns that water to its origin.

          Aristotle was the first to be credited with pioneering a study of the water-vapor cycle. In his “Meteorlogica”, he theorized that clouds were made up of condensing water vapor. However, his conclusion was that this was a local occurrence, and “rain replaced the water in the area from which it had vaporized” (Schnabel, 40). Until it was accepted that the earth was round, most believed that the water that flowed into the ocean simply spilled off the edge, and it was not until 1770, when Benjamin Franklin performed numerous scientific experiments related to weather, that it was discovered that clouds can carry their moisture great distances.