Traces of a similar representation of the universe can be found in Old Testament texts like Job 9, 26, 28 and 38, Psalms 8, 19, 24, 90, 102, 104 and 148, Proverbs 8, Amos 9,6 and Isaiah 40, among others. In Job 26,11 we read: "The pillars of heaven tremble". Amos 9,6 reiterates: "God builds his abodes in heaven, and has founded his troop upon the earth." The pillars of the earth, in turn, appear in even more numerous texts, such as 1 Samuel 2,8, Job 9,6, Psalm 18,15, 24,2, 75,3, 102,25, 104,5, Proverbs 8,29 and Isaiah 40,18.
So many references to the foundation, in which the heavenly and earthly worlds rest show that the creation accounts of Genesis presuppose the worldview of ancient people. We cannot fail to recognize that this is a particular nuisance, since the mechanisms the ancients believed that supported the heavens and its upper waters were simply mistaken.
What scholars seldom say is that the nuisance began in biblical times and increased in the first centuries of Christian era. One of the reasons was the influence of the works of Greek philosophers and of Egyptian and Babylonian astronomers on theologians like Ambrose and Origen, who conceived nature quite differently from traditional thinking. However, the commitment of these theologians to Scripture was so unwavering that we cannot consider they changed their biblical ideas because of astronomical findings. We rather ask if they did not reinterpret the physical world based on biblical evidence, as well as philosophers and astronomers did it based on their own investigation of nature.
It is impossible to understand what early Christian theologians held concerning the physical world without admitting that they problematized the biblical references to the solid firmament, the columns of heaven and earth and other aspects of the worldview of ancient men. Problematize does not mean reject, but expresses doubt and suggests new interpretations of Scripture expressions that reflect those older conceptions.
I have chosen to start this series on biblical creation from the Christian thinkers of centuries II through VI, because the mistrust they nurtured about the ancient worldview cannot be attributed to the desire to correct it based on scientific findings. If 21th century people suggested an exegesis of creation that harmonized the account of the Bible with modern science, they would be put under suspicion, since it is easier to correct mistakes after they become evident. But ancient authors did not know modern science, which made the mistakes patent. Therefore, the mistrust they kept regarding the archaic worldview should be investigated to check whether they did not find reasons to relativize it in the Bible.
In the sixth century, Boethius summarized the progress made by astronomers and the questioning of Christian theologians, in a famous passage: "The whole earth, as you know thanks to the statements of astronomers, compared to the extent of heaven is but a small point. This means that, compared to the length of the heavens, the magnitude of the earth is nearly nothing. And of such a small region, only a quarter, according to the calculations of Ptolemy, is inhabited by living beings. So, if you take from this quarter the area covered by oceans, lakes, deserts, etc. only a tiny part remains that is inhabited by men" (BOETHIUS, Severino. Consolation of Philosophy. Sao Paulo: Martins Fontes 2012. p. 46).
This description of heaven by Boethius challenges the geocentric conception of the semicircle founded on columns, which placed the earth at the center of the universe. It emerges from an alternative vision of the physical world, which developed in Greece, Israel and other nations.
On the passage of the Book of Job which says that God "hangs the earth upon nothing" (Job 26,7), Ambrose of Milan wrote: "God hangs the earth on nothing. We should not give birth to a controversy by asking if it is suspended in the air or lies on the water. Or how the nature of the air, which is thin and soft, can sustain the weight of the earth. Or how the mass of the land does not fall and sink in the water [...] Just as the earth is suspended in a vacuum and remains motionless due to the balance exercised by every weight, so the water is balanced with the earth because of weights equal or greater than her own. And for the same reason the sea does not spread over the land" (MILAN, Ambrose of. The six days of creation. Sao Paulo: Paulus, 2009. p. 66).
This quotation reflects the belief that the earth rests on solid foundations, as well as on water and air. These three elements are mixed in the soil, and the specific mode of the mixing is responsible for sustaining the earth and the seas.
Therefore, according to Ambrose, "we cannot think that the earth is actually supported by columns, but by the virtue that sustains and maintains its substance" (Op. cit. p. 35). The word virtue is not used here in the moral sense, but with a physical meaning. It indicates a property of matter. And there is no reason to doubt that this use of the term leads to an authentic reinterpretation of the underground columns.
Let us proceed to another aspect of the old view. Not few people argue that the belief in the existence of waters above the firmament was a mistake, but this judgment is possible only if we adopt the perspective of modern man. To the ancients, the word water had an elastic meaning, as appears from the following passage of Ambrose: "The water is one and the same. It generally assumes different appearances [...] It is acid in premature juices, bitter in absinthe, has more intense flavor in the wine, is more sour in other drinks, has bad taste in poisons, is sweet in honey [...] Some varieties produce bitter saps, others produce sweet ones, early or late. Their perfumes can also be distinguished. One is the scent of the vine, another of the olive tree, another of the cherry, another of the fig tree, it is different in the apple tree, unique in the palm tree" (Op. cit. pp. 121-122).
Ancient man did not have the scientific information we have about nature. So he considered that juices, wines, sap and tree resins contained water or were water with special properties. Of course, with so many possible kinds of water, Jews and Christians did not dare to assert accurately what the waters above the firmament were.
It should be remembered that, many centuries before Ambrose, the author of Job acknowledged his ignorance on what existed in heaven: "Does rain have a father? Who generates the drops of dew? Where does the ice come from? And who gives birth to the frost of heaven? [...] Do you know the ordinances of heaven? Do you know how they established their dominion over the earth? [ ... ] Who instilled wisdom in the cloud layers? Who gave understanding to the meteor? Who counted the number of the clouds? (Job 38,28-29,33,36-37)".
Ambrose’s questionings echo the Book of Job. But if the biblical authors formulate so many questions, is it possible to understand their sayings as final judgments about nature? Did not Ambrose have good reasons to delve into the questions of Job, as he did, instead of turning them into peremptory statements?
Ambrose outlined a synthesis of what was known and not known in his time about heaven: "We hear the thunder produced by the collision of clouds [...] but cannot say exactly how the air condenses into clouds and the rain is produced therein. We often see the clouds come out of the mountains and wonder: does the water rise from the land or descend from heaven to the earth? If it rises, it is certainly against nature, because it is heavier and is transported through the air, which is more tenuous" (Op. cit. pp. 62, 65-66).
Ambrose clearly admits that the water rises from the earth to the clouds, but does not explain how a liquid can become air, which condenses into cloud. He knows that rainfall results from the collision of clouds, but does not know how or why it happens.
Ambrose's words on the upstroke of the waters from the earth to the clouds reflect Isaiah's statement: "As the rain comes down and the snow from heaven, and do not return there, until they water the earth and fertilize and make it bear and sprout forth, that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so will my word be which goes forth from my mouth ; it will not return to me vainly, but it will accomplish what I delight in, and it will prosper in the matter to which I have sent it" (Is 55:10-11). If the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return without watering the ground and fertilizing the soil, it follows that they return after doing so. That´s what the author of Isaiah stated. Could ancient man find words more consistent with the description that science gives about the evaporation of the water?
The author of Job also declares that God "stretches out the north over empty space" (Job 26,7). He "is who alone stretches out the heavens" (Job 9,8). The psalmist and the book of Isaiah corroborate: "God extends the sky like a curtain" (Ps. 104:2), "It is he who stretches out the heavens like a curtain" (Isa. 40:22).
The verb stretch used in these verses suggests that heaven is not fixed. It also makes it implicit that the firmament created in the second and fourth days of Genesis 1 is made of air. As such, it is treated as an expansion in Genesis, Job, Psalms and Isaiah. In none of these verses, we find the celestial solid vault seated on columns.
These passages are true seeds of the suspicion developed by patristic authors like Boethius and Ambrose about the archaic worldview. The old view was not abandoned by them, but we consider that it was ransacked and reinterpreted as a series of questions, hypotheses and variations on nature embedded in the Bible.
The conjectures and variations can be translated in a single word: problematization. Modern man feels a strong attraction for ready and established doctrines. But it is clear that Scripture not always contains them. Very few doctrines in it are ready and established. The majority has been affirmed as partial or just possible truths.
It is worth remembering that the questioning implicit in the verses just quoted is amplified by the poetic language in which it was expressed. There is virtually no similar statement in historical or doctrinal texts of Scripture. The big exception is Genesis 1. And since poetic texts are impregnated with figurative senses, it is not even possible to say that biblical descriptions of nature are properly right or wrong.
The authors quoted (Boethius and Ambrose) are two among many others that problematized traditional descriptions of nature. How many similar questionings can we extract from St. Augustine’s three reviews of Genesis? As many as we want. And from Origen? Also as many as we desire. Take the example of a single passage in which the latter conjectures about life and soul. He says: “Among the beings that move, a few are the cause of their own movement. There are many others that move by something external. Those that are moved from outside are objects that we carry, such as wood [...] Animals, plants and everything that has soul have in themselves the cause of their movement. Some people say that metallic veins, fire and perhaps water sources also have in themselves the cause of their movements" (ALEXANDRIA, Origen. Against Celsus. Sao Paulo: Paulus , 2004).
What should be concluded from these considerations, except that patristic authors questioned the ancient worldview based on the Bible? The work of these authors shows that Christian conception of nature has emerged from the disintegration of the old worldview. Therefore it does not reproduce that view. If elements of archaic representation of the world can be found in Scripture, it is much more as problems than as assertions, much more with the meaning of questions than of dogmas.
