Not for something on the scale of the flood.
That's subjective. You act as if it's objective when it isn't. There is room for nuance in the interpretation that could include a canopy.
Of course it's a figure of speech.
But it's describing what literally happened.
Fountains push water into the air.
Floodgates let water fall.
Geshem rain doesn't last for forty days.
So where did the rain come from?
The sluices of the heavens.
Where did the water behind those sluices come from?
The fountains of the great deep.
That's a viable interpretation. But it's still an interpretation that has room for variation depending on the evidence and there is evidence for a canopy.
No need to add anything to scripture.
Really? You are accusing me of adding to scripture because I don't necessarily agree with your interpretation? Are you sure you want to make that an issue? Adding to scripture is a serious offense, while not necessarily agreeing on the nuance of an interpretation of a figure is healthy. Godly even!
It's explained by the fountains of the great deep breaking forth.
Sure. And it could possibly also be explained by a canopy.
This idea falls apart when you remember that Moses wrote all of Genesis (barring the last few verses), not Noah.
Also, as far as we know, it didn't rain before the flood.
kgov.com
I was describing your view. For you to read that and say the idea falls apart is pretty funny. Here, read it again with underlining:
"It could also mean that every time it rained, at least to Noah, that he wanted to differentiate rain from normal watering he was used to
since he hadn't seen rain like this before. So he added a phrase to let people know this wasn't the usual water the way they normally got it, but a crazy
new form that came from the heavens in such great amounts it was like floodgates were opened."
You're missing the important part.
It's a cause and effect sequence.
Fountains broke forth.
Windows of heaven were opened.
Rain fell for forty days and nights.
You're missing the important part.
It's a cause and effect sequence.
Fountains broke forth.
Windows of heaven were opened.
Rain fell for forty days and nights.
... this is exactly what I say, with the implication that the fountains (cause) tore through the canopy (effect).
You know what a fountain is, and how it works.
You know what a sluice is, and how it works.
You know what rain is, but you don't know how it falls for forty days and nights.
OK. So far no different than how I'd say it...
A canopy cannot answer that question, not without appealing to miracles, which the Bible does not imply occurred. You have to read such a miracle or phenomena into the text in order for your belief to work.
HPT, on the other hand, can and does answer the question, and sufficiently, as to what "the windows of the heavens"
Answer the question about how it got destroyed? What are you talking about? Why does that take a miracle? What miracle are you talking about?
Except that the Bible doesn't say canopy.
It says Fountains of the Great Deep broke forth. Which means that water goes up into the air.
It says the Windows of the Heavens were opened. Which means that the water that went up, or at least some of it, came back down.
It says the geshem rain fell for forty days and forty nights.
It says that after those forty days and nights, the Windows of Heaven were closed, and the rain ceased, but the waters remained on the earth for another one hundred fifty days.
It doesn't say or allow for a canopy, of any kind.
Sure it does. It says 'windows of heaven' which was possibly a canopy. I'd speculate God didn't have to mention it separately because it was a technical detail of the atmosphere outside of the scope of the creation story.
Sure it does. floodgates and sluices are things water is channeled through, which adds to the idea of a thing the water went through while water coming back down is an event not a thing.
A canopy cannot be opened or closed.
It can be ripped open. And all figures break down at some point and is well within understanding the destroyed canopy ending or stopping to mean closed.
Again, do we have a Hebrew scholar that can give us some more information here?
Saying it doesn't make it so, Yorzhik.
It certainly is so that 'windows of heaven' is a figure that needs to be interpreted because it could have some variation in what it's referring to. It could be referring to an event or to a feature of the atmosphere that changed.
But you have to read "canopy" into the text to get to that point. Eisegesis is not a good way to study the Bible.
The rain stopped long before the water receded explains the canopy just as well because it doesn't mean anything to a canopy at all at that point in the text.
You keep saying that the rain stopping before the water receded says something against the canopy. Can you spell that out? Clearly, as I've been describing the canopy, that couldn't mean anything to/about/for the canopy and in fact would be expected because it would probably have been a wispy thing that would have broken down quickly.
Who are you talking to? Since I've repeatedly, again and again, and with much redundancy said I don't support VPC, this isn't addressed to me.
But I'm willing to answer some questions in that section anyway:
What was the canopy made from? I'm not sure of the mix of elements that made it, but I would be more inclined to say there was some water involved, but it did not necessarily need any water at all.
What was its construction? I'd have even less speculation about this not knowing what it was made from, and knowing it did not necessarily need to have any water at all.
Was it fragile? Certainly. It probably would have taken a lot less than the fountains of the great deep ripping through it to take it down. It's just that before the flood nothing drastic enough to do that had happened.
The reference was not to the canopy but to the sequence of events. Let me rephrase to make it clear:
"What are you talking about? Of course if there was a canopy it was ripped through before it came down. That's probably what would have brought the canopy down if it was there.
I'm still not seeing why you think the rain happening after the fountains broke open does not allow for a canopy when that's exactly how a canopy being brought down would be described.
Notice this does not change the meaning of what I said, but still makes a statement that implies a question you did not answer.
If it was brought down, then why does Genesis 8:2 say that "the windows of heaven were also stopped", after it was supposedly brought down?
Because it's a figure that matches the previous one. Certainly something that was destroyed is stopped.
Again, it's a cause and effect sequence. Water launched into the air, water comes back down (as though floodgates were opened), and water continues coming down for forty days. After forty days, the waters remained on the earth for one hundred fifty days, despite the windows of heaven being closed.
What are you talking about? Why does what you say here matter to the canopy as I've described it? What you are saying here is exactly what I say, so it's nothing against what I say just because you say it.
I think there is a communication disconnect where you think this somehow means something about/for/against the idea of a canopy. I can't figure out what it is though.
Let me try going through each part:
it's a cause and effect sequence
It certainly is.
Water launched into the air, water comes back down (as though floodgates were opened), and water continues coming down for forty days
Exactly. And this is where the canopy got destroyed. Opened, like a piece of glass, as it were.
After forty days, the waters remained on the earth for one hundred fifty days, despite the windows of heaven being closed.
Yes. I describe it with exactly the same words in the same order. The canopy was gone after 40 days, changing the atmosphere from then on.
Maybe the disconnect is in the word "despite". 'Despite' what? I'd say "despite the rain stopping the great deep continued to empty".
There's no reason to assume "canopy."
There is no reason to assume a canopy
just because the rain stopped after 40 days. There is a reason to speculate there was a possible canopy because the windows of heaven are mentioned, which is a figure that could very well include a canopy, and there are clues about differences in a pre-flood atmosphere that could have their explanation in a canopy.
And just one more note: Moses wrote Genesis, but he could have very likely gotten an account of the flood from something Noah wrote. Bob Ball, I don't know if you remember him but he was a rocket scientist that used to frequent TOL before his passing and was a YEC, a strong advocate for many topics you would agree with including HPT. He was a friend and supporter of Bob Enyart and they spoke face to face on occasion because both Bobs were in South Bend where Enyart did his TV show for a while. Bob Ball was an advocate for the tablet theory, although he never mentioned Wiseman, he did link to a
Curt Sewell article, where Wiseman is brought up, that I think explains it at least as well as wiki. But either way, if it were God that was dictating to Moses or if Moses was editing a compilation of the tablets he had, the style of the flood account itself is somewhat more a log book and less prose according to Bob (either Bob if I recall), and in any case is an account of what happened to Noah and how Noah would have written the account if he wrote it down.
