From CapnG:
"Sigh... here we go...
The earth's orbit around the sun isn't realated to UFOs... in any way... at all. I don't see the connection. I do see someone reaching to try and bat away an honest criticism of biblical inaccuracy."
Unfortunately this is one of those statements which I am bound by those higher up than I to respond to.
Absolutely no where in the Word of God, whether it be the old or new testaments, does it directly state that the Sun evolves around the planet Earth, or that the planet Earth is the center of the universe. It does state in a correctly interpreted context from both the Greek and Hebrew languages solely to show Man's importance to God, that we as human beings are the center of the universe. Unfortunately many Machiavellian theorists like Copernicus looked to enhance canon and were wrong in their theories.
Man is not a perfect being and we make mistakes.
Does this mean that Christians have it wrong?
If we utilize this measurement tool to judge, than who is right?
Lastly, read the following part of the URL I sent and it will show Martin Luther, a man who believed in the purity of the Word and not a Catholic interpretation which looked to enhance or do just what interpreting "center" as "Earth as center" mantained:
...............................
2.6 Sixteenth Century Reactions to On the Revolutions
Copernicus's fame and book made its way across Europe over the next fifty years, and a second edition was brought out in 1566.<sup>[
12]</sup> As Gingerich's census of the extant copies showed, the book was read and commented on by astronomers. Gingerich (2004, 55) noted “the majority of sixteenth-century astronomers thought eliminating the equant was Copernicus' big achievement.”
While Martin Luther may have made negative comments about Copernicus because the idea of the heliocentric universe seemed to contradict the Bible,<sup>[
13]</sup> Philip Melanchthon (1497–1560), who presided over the curriculum at the University of Wittenberg, eventually accepted the importance of teaching Copernicus's ideas, perhaps because Osiander's preface made the work more palatable. His son-in-law Caspar Peucer (1525-1602) taught astronomy there and began teaching Copernicus's work. As a result, the University of Wittenberg became a center where Copernicus's work was studied. But Rheticus was the only Wittenberg scholar who accepted the heliocentric idea. Robert Westman (1975a, 166–67) suggested that there was a ‘Wittenberg Interpretation’: astronomers appreciated and adopted some of Copernicus's mathematical models but rejected his cosmology, and some were pleased with his replacement of the equant by epicyclets. One of these was Erasmus Reinhold (1511–1553), a leading astronomer at Wittenberg who became dean and rector. He produced a new set of planetary tables from Copernicus's work, the Prutenic Tables. Although, as Gingerich (1993, 232) pointed out, “there was relatively little to distinguish between the accuracy of the
Alfonsine Tables and the
Prutenic Tables,” the latter were more widely adopted; Gingerich plausibly suggested that the fact that the Prutenic Tables more accurately predicted a conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn in 1563 made the difference. Reinhold did not accept the heliocentric theory, but he admired the elimination of the equant. The Prutenic Tables excited interest in Copernicus's work.
Tycho Brahe (1546–1601) was the greatest astronomical observer before the invention of the telescope. He called Copernicus a ‘second Ptolemy’ (quoted in Westman 1975, 307) and appreciated both the elimination of the equant and the creation of a planetary system. But Tycho could not adopt the Copernican system, partly for the religious reason that it went against what the Bible seemed to preach. He, therefore, adopted a compromise, the ‘geoheliostatic’ system in which the two inner planets revolved around the sun and that system along with the rest of the planets revolved around the earth.
Among Catholics, Christoph Clavius (1537–1612) was the leading astronomer in the sixteenth century. A Jesuit himself, he incorporated astronomy into the Jesuit curriculum and was the principal scholar behind the creation of the Gregorian calendar. Like the Wittenberg astronomers, Clavius adopted Copernican mathematical models when he felt them superior, but he believed that Ptolemy's cosmology — both his ordering of the planets and his use of the equant — was correct.
Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) had reacted favorably to a talk about Copernicus's theories, rewarding the speaker with a rare manuscript. There is no indication of how Pope Paul III, to whom
On the Revolutions was dedicated reacted; however, a trusted advisor, Bartolomeo Spina of Pisa (1474–1546) intended to condemn it but fell ill and died before his plan was carried out (see Rosen, 1975). Thus, in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology, and this is clearly shown in Finocchiaro's reconstruction of the accusations against Bruno (see also Blumenberg's part 3, chapter 5, titled “Not a Martyr for Copernicanism: Giordano Bruno”).
Michael Maestlin (1550–1631) of the University of Tübingen was the earliest astronomer after Rheticus to adopt Copernicus's heliocentricism. Although he wrote a popular textbook that was geocentric, he taught his students that the heliocentric system was superior. He also rejected Osiander's preface. Maestlin's pupil Johannes Kepler wrote the first book since the publication of
On the Revolutions that was openly heliocentric in its orientation, the
Mysterium cosmographicum (Secret of the Universe). And, of course, Kepler eventually built on Copernicus's work to create a much more accurate description of the solar system.
unctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w
ontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--> Once again I see where I must clarify what it is I am stating. If you understood the context of my quotation correctly which you included in your reply, you would notice that the actual statement was in fact that my religious beliefs have NOT been proven EITHER right or wrong, but merely utilized as a foundation for an all inclusive justification, one based upon the lack of an ongoing (scientifically or otherwise based) factual explanation whatsoever.
I was thinking in terms of resistance to local pathogens or adjustment to terrestrial gravity.
