Noah Primeval (Chronicles of the Nephilim) (35 page)

Isa. 34:4

All the host of heaven shall rot away, and
the skies roll up like a scroll
. All their host
shall fall, as leaves fall
from the vine.

Rev. 6:13-14

[An earthquake occurs] and
the
stars of the sky fell to the earth
as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale. The
sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up
, and every mountain and island was removed from its place.

Matt. 24:29

“T
he
stars will fall from heaven
, and the
powers of the heavens will be shaken
.”

Job 26:11

“The
pillars of heaven tremble
, and are astounded at His rebuke.

2Sam. 22:8

Then the earth reeled and rocked; the
foundations of the heavens trembled
and quaked
.

Is. 13:13

Therefore
I shall make
the heavens tremble
, and
the earth will be shaken
out of its place at the wrath of the LORD of hosts.

Joel 2:10

T
he earth quakes before them,
the heavens tremble
.

Waters Above the Heavens

Now on to the highest point of the Mesopotamian cosmography, the “highest heavens,” or “heaven of heavens,” where God has established his temple and throne (Deut. 26:15; Psa. 11:4; 33:13; 103:19). But God’s throne also happens to be in the midst of a sea of waters that reside there. These are the waters that are above the firmament, that the firmament holds back from falling to earth (Gen. 1:6-8).

Psa. 148:4

Praise him, you
highest heavens
, and you
waters above the heavens
!

Psa. 104:2-3

Stretching out
the heavens
like a tent. He lays
the beams of his chambers on the waters
.

Psa. 29:3, 10

The voice of the
LORD is over the waters
... the LORD,
over many waters
… The LORD sits
enthroned over the flood
[not a reference to the flood of Noah, but to these waters above the heavens]
[105]
the LORD sits enthroned as king forever.

Jer. 10:13

When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of
waters in the heavens
,

Ezek. 28:2

“I sit in the
seat of the gods, in the heart of the seas
.”

The solid firmament that holds back the heavenly waters has “windows of the heavens” (“floodgates” in the NASB) that let the water through to rain upon the earth.

Gen. 7:11

A
ll the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the
windows of the heavens
were opened.

Gen. 8:2

T
he fountains of the deep and the
windows of the heavens
were closed, and the rain from the heavens was restrained.

Isa. 24:18

For the
windows of heaven
are opened, and the foundations of the earth tremble.

So, What’s Wrong With the Bible?

The sheer volume of passages throughout both Testaments illustrating the parallels with Mesopotamian cosmography seem to prove a deeply rooted ancient pre-scientific worldview that permeates the Scriptures, and that worldview consists of a three-tiered universe with God on a heavenly throne above a heavenly sea, underneath which is a solid vaulted dome with the sun, moon, and stars connected to it, covering the flat disc earth, founded immovably firm on pillars, surrounded by a circular sea, on top of a watery abyss, beneath which is the underworld of Sheol.

Some well-intentioned Evangelicals seek to maintain their particular definition of Biblical inerrancy by denying that the Bible contains this ancient Near Eastern cosmography. They try to explain it away as phenomenal language or poetic license. Phenomenal language is the act of describing what one sees subjectively from one’s perspective without further claiming objective reality. So when the writer says the sun stood still, or that the sun rises and sets within the solid dome of heaven, he is only describing his observation, not cosmic reality. The claim of observation from a personal frame of reference is certainly true as far as it goes. Of course the observer describes what they are observing. But the distinction between appearance and reality is an imposition of our alien modern understanding onto theirs. As Seely explains,

It is precisely because ancient peoples were scientifically naive that they did not distinguish between the appearance of the sky and their scientific concept of the sky. They had no reason to doubt what their eyes told them was true, namely, that the stars above them were fixed in a solid dome and that the sky literally touched the earth at the horizon. So, they equated appearance with reality and concluded that the sky must be a solid physical part of the universe just as much as the earth itself.
[106]

If the ancients did not know the earth was a sphere in space, they could not know that their observations of appearances were anything other than reality. It would be easy enough to relegate one or two examples of Scripture to the notion of phenomenal language, but when dozens of those phenomenal descriptions reflect the same complex integrated picture of the universe that Israel’s neighbors shared, and when that picture included many elements that were
not
phenomenally observable, such as the Abyss, Sheol, or the pillars of earth and heaven, it strains credulity to suggest these were merely phenomenal descriptions intentionally unrelated to reality. If it walks a like a Mesopotamian duck and talks like a Mesopotamian duck, then chances are they thought it was a Mesopotamian duck, not just the “appearance” of one having no reality.

It would be a mistake to claim that there is a single monolithic Mesopotamian cosmography.
[107]
There are varieties of stories with overlapping imagery, and some contradictory notions. But there are certainly enough commonalities to affirm a generic yet mysterious picture of the universe. And that picture in Scripture undeniably includes poetic language. The Hebrew culture was imaginative. They integrated poetry into everything, including their observational descriptions of nature. Thus a hymn of creation such as Psalm 19 tells of the heavens declaring God’s glory as if using speech, and then describes the operations of the sun in terms of a bridegroom in his chamber or a man running a race. Metaphor is inescapable and ubiquitous.

And herein lies a potential solution for the dilemma of the scientific inaccuracy of the Mesopotamian cosmic geography in Scripture:
The Israelite culture, being pre-scientific, thought more in terms of function and purpose than material structure
. Even if their picture of the heavens and earth as a three-tiered geocentric cosmology, was scientifically “false” from our modern perspective, it nevertheless still accurately describes the teleological purpose and meaning of creation that they were intending to communicate.

Othmar Keel, one of the leading scholars on Ancient Near Eastern art has argued that even though modern depictions of the ancient worldview like the illustration of the three-tiered universe above are helpful, they are fundamentally flawed because they depict a “profane, lifeless, virtually closed mechanical system,” which reflects our own modern bias. To the ancient Near East “rather, the world was an entity open at every side. The powers which determine the world are of more interest to the ancient Near East than the structure of the cosmic system. A wide variety of diverse, uncoordinated notions regarding the cosmic structure were advanced from various points of departure.”
[108]

John Walton has written recently of this ANE concern with powers over structure in direct relation to the creation story of Genesis. He argues that in the ancient world existence was understood more in terms of function within a god-created
purposeful
order
than in terms of material status within a natural physical structure.
[109]
This is not to say that the physical world was denied or ignored, but rather that the priority and interests were different from our own. We should therefore be careful in judging their purpose-driven cosmography too strictly in light of our own material-driven cosmography. And in this sense, modern material descriptions of reality are just as “false” as the ancient pictures because they do not include the immaterial aspect of reality: Meaning and purpose.

Biblical writers did not
teach
their cosmography as scientific doctrine revealed by God about the way the physical universe was materially structured, they
assumed
the popular cosmography to teach their doctrine about God’s purposes and intent. To critique the cosmic model carrying the message is to miss the meaning altogether, which is the message. God’s throne may not be physically above us in waters held back by a solid firmament, but he truly does rule “over” us and is king and sustainer of creation in whatever model man uses to depict that creation. The phrase “every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth” (Rev. 5:13) is equivalent in meaning to the modern concept of every particle and wave in every dimension of the Big Bang space-time continuum, as well as every person dead or alive in heaven or hell
.

The geocentric picture in Scripture is a depiction through man’s ancient perspective of God’s purpose and humankind’s significance. For a modern heliocentrist to attack that picture as falsifying the theology would be cultural imperialism. Reducing significance to physical location is simply a prejudice of material priority over spiritual purpose. One of the humorous ironies of this debate is that if the history of science is any judge, a thousand years from now, scientists will no doubt consider our current paradigm with which we judge the ancients to be itself fatally flawed. This is not to reduce reality to relativism, but rather to illustrate that all claims of empirical knowledge contain an inescapable element of human fallibility and finitude. A proper response should be a bit more humility and a bit less hubris regarding the use of our own scientific models as standards in judging theological meaning or purpose.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brian Godawa is the screenwriter for the award-winning feature film,
To End All Wars,
starring Kiefer Sutherland. It was awarded the Commander in Chief Medal of Service, Honor and Pride by the Veterans of Foreign Wars, won the first Heartland Film Festival by storm, and showcased the Cannes Film Festival Cinema for Peace.

He also co-wrote
Alleged
, starring Brian Dennehy as Clarence Darrow and Fred Thompson as William Jennings Bryan. He previously adapted to film the bestselling supernatural thriller novel
The Visitation
by author Frank Peretti for Ralph Winter (
X-Men, Wolverine
), and wrote and directed
Wall of Separation,
a PBS documentary, and
Lines That Divide
, a documentary on stem cell research.

Mr. Godawa’s scripts have won multiple awards in
respected screenplay competitions, and his articles on movies and philosophy have been published around the world. He has traveled around the United States teaching on movies, worldviews, and culture to colleges, churches and community groups.

His book,
Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom and Discernment
has been released in a revised edition from InterVarsity Press. His book
Word Pictures: Knowing God Through Story and Imagination
(IVP) addresses the power of image and story in the pages of the Bible to transform the Christian life.

Find out more about his other books, lecture tapes and dvds for sale at his website
www.godawa.com.

Noah Primeval is the First in a Series!

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Enoch Primordial
is one chapter of the series saga
Chronicles of the Nephilim
, that charts the rise and fall of the Nephilim and just what their place is in the evil plans of the fallen sons of God called, “The Watchers.”

Book 1,
Noah Primeval
, reveals the hero’s journey of Noah that leads to God’s first act of justice against this diabolical plan of the Watchers: The Deluge.

The Prequel, or Lost Book 2,
Enoch Primordial
tells the forgotten story of the original descent of the Watchers on Mount Hermon and their introduction of the Nephilim into the created order.

Book 3,
Gilgamesh Immortal
tells the story of the first Giant King after the Flood, Gilgamesh of Uruk and his epic search for eternal life.

Read the rest of the series to discover just how far the Seed of the Serpent will go in its war on the Seed of Eve
.