Modern Science and The Long Day of Joshua—'Part Two
By Harry Rimmer, Sc.D.*
^ t “^HE unbelieving scientists offer three objections to the Biblical ac- -A. count of Joshua’s commanding the sun to stand still. The first is this: “Joshua told the sun and moon to stand still, while we know that the sun and the moon do not move; it is the earth that moves around the sun. This language is quite natural to the day and time of Joshua; for he, of course, knew nothing of the theory of heliocentricity, and to his natural eye it looked as if the sun did move around the earth. But we know now that this is a scientific mistake, and an impossi bility.” There is a profound and deep fallacy in all this reasoning of the critic. Or we should say, two fallacies. The first is the limitation of Joshua’s knowledge. We do not know whether Joshua knew that our solar system is heliocentric or not, and it does not matter either way. For this account was not written out of Joshua’s knowledge. It came by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, who used Joshua as a simple instrument to preserve the reve lation in a written form, and He knows all things! The second fallacy is the language ascribed to Joshua. Joshua did not say to the sun and moon “ stand still!” You know, of course, that Joshua spoke in Hebrew, not in English, and this text was written in the Hebrew language. To get it into an English version, it had to be translated from the original. So before we criticize Joshua, let us look at his own language and see just what he did say. Out of this sentence under discussion, it will suffice to attract at tention to just one Hebrew word. When Joshua spoke he said, “ Sun, be thou damam.” The word damam appears in the Old Testament a total number of twenty-one times, and in no other single place is it translated “ stand still.” The word is the typical Hebrew equivalent of the Eng lish phrase, “ be silent.” The Hebrew word for “ stand” is “ amad.” The word “ amad” appears in the Old Testament many hundreds of times, and is consis tently translated “ stand” and “ stand still.” It occurs in this tenth chapter of *Reproduced by permission from the book T he H armony of S cience and S cripture . Copyright by Research Science Bureau, Inc.
this occasion, however, in reply to Josh ua’s sudden cry for relief, the great shower of hailstones came. This was a two-fold answer; the air cooled and re freshed the army, and the hailstones slew the enemy. The events of that day are evidently not given in their chronological order in the tenth chapter of Joshua. Verses seven to ten constitute a complete, ab breviated, epitomized record of the en tire victory. Verses eleven to fifteen con tain additional detail added to the epitomized record, to bring a fuller illu mination and add glory to the name of God. The chronology of the events of the battle can best be worked out by correlating the geographical positions of the points that are named, such as Beth-horon, Azekah, and Makkedah. So we have first of all the complete account of the success of the battle, and then a statement is made that in the course of the battle great hailstones fell upon the fleeing horde. Following that, the record is given as to why. the hailstones came, namely, in response to the prayer of Joshua. Now note that the text says that the sun was silenced, but it does not say that time ceased. It says, “ The sun hasted not to go down.” \ Time slowed down! In other words, time was prolonged. Now we know that physical time is merely man’s acquiescence to the math ematics of God. Our day, for instance, is just the space of hours and minutes it takes this earth to revolve on its axis one complete revolution. The mean av erage of all the year is exactly twenty- three hours, fifty-six minutes, four and nine-tenths seconds for each day. The earth keeps her schedule on her annual journey of five hundred and fifty million miles to such accuracy that she never varies as much as one one-hundredth of a second a year; and her daily rotation must be on the same plane of accuracy. It has been said that if this diurnal rotation had slowed down at the rate of one one-hundredth of a second each day, for just six thousand years, the day would now be more than thirty hours long, and the year would be composed of only two hundred and ninety-two of these days. At any rate, the argument of infidel ity totally collapses at every point, as Joshua did not say to the sun, “ stand
Joshua, in the eighth verse, where God promises Joshua victory over his ene mies, saying, “ There shall not one of them stand (amad) before thee.” So when Joshua spoke to the sun, he said, “ Sun, be thou silent.” The mar ginal reading of every Bible in our per sonal possession gives this translation. Look in your own Bible and see what the margin says, just by way of con firmation. Now see the logic in this cry. Joshua didn’t want more sunshine; sun shine was his great handicap! Israel had made a magnificent forced march. They had started at Gilgal, and to get in behind the enemy and chase him away from his own cities and de fenses, the army had marched more than forty miles in ten hours! They were loaded down with armor, spears, stones for the slings, bows, arrows, and all the accoutrements of ancient warfare. They had had no rest, and after this march of ten hours they began fighting. They fought about seven hours without rest, when the enemy broke and fled. It was the twenty-second day of July, at noon. According to the average ob tained from all the meteorological rec ords ever kept in Palestine for. this month of July, the thermometer regis tered between 105 and 120 degrees in the shade; and there was no shade for ten miles! The task of the army was the extermination of this allied host, and the host was in flight. The soldiers of Israel had marched all night—they had started fighting at the break of day—and it was high noon when the enemy broke and fled. They had had no rest or refresh ment, and were exhausted by the hand- to-hand combat. The tired army of Israel, oppressed by the terrific heat, dropped in their places, and had no strength to'run after a fleeing enemy. In this hour of extremity Joshua prayed, literally, “ Hush up that sun!” (“ Sun, be thou silent.” ) The answer was instantaneous. A black cloud darkened the sun, and a storm of icy hail fell. And this in a season of the year when it never has been known to rain in Palestine! The first rains begin in our month of No vember with light thunder showers, and the last rains cease in April, again dying out with light showers. From De cember to February, twenty to thirty inches of rain will fall, but never a drop comes down in the summer season. On
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