Universe and Matter in Genesis 1:2?

In a beginning, God had created the form of Heaven and the form of Earth
And when Earth was an astonishing-desert . . .

Universe and Matter Interpretation

Some choose to interpret the universe and matter into the first two verses of Genesis 1. If they choose this route they are tasked with convincing the jury that God and the sacred author used figurative language in this context, e.g. Earth figuratively refers to matter. They are also tasked with defining the key words universe and matter in no uncertain terms. Then they are tasked with convincing the jury that their definitions of the key words universe and matter is what God and the sacred author directly intended to communicate to the reader via the figures they chose. For example you will have to explain how the sacred author knew your definition of matter's creation ex nihilo well enough to describe it using figures of speech. Did the sacred author see matter, figure it as the Earth, and then describe it as a tohu wabohu??? Or did the sacred author go to school in Greece, learn Aristotle's concepts of matter and decide to put it in his own words???  Is it even possible that the sacred author referred to matter via the word 'Earth'???

Similar with those commentators who wish to adopt a models of modern physics and assume them to the Sacred Text. Convince me, the jury, that the sacred author saw the Big-Bang or studied general and special relativity as well as quantum mechanics at Oxford. Convince me that the sacred author saw the Higg's Boson field and particle and decided to represent it with the words Earth and tōhû wābōhû.

History of Matter Interpretations

In his survey of Genesis 1 translations and interpretations through the ages Jaki begins with the ancient Jewish sages who lived after the Hellenistic invasion of the Middle East. He mentions:

"Some took the tohu and bohu as the prime matter from which light and darkness were respectively created." (Jaki, Stanley J. Genesis Through the Ages, Chapter 1: Genesis 1 and Jewish Sages, p. 37)

Some Jewish sages were likely influenced by Grecian notions of matter perhaps Aristotle's. Aristotle's vague matter concept was linked to his change of substance and form concepts. These terms were used rather ambiguously. But the problem with this line of interpretation of that the concept 'matter' was not something the ancient Hebrew author conceived of. He lived well before Aristotle and the Grecian philosophers. This alone should rule out the matter interpretation of Gen 1:2. Do you really think the ancient Hebrew sacred author and possible prophet knew of the Greek concepts of matter? If so which Greek philosopher did he follow?  Aristotle or Democritus?  Is it even possible to retain intellectual honesty when travelling down this foreign interpretive path?

Through history the matter interpretation continues to appear. Some Christians have adopted the matter interpretation. Saint Basil, a Church Father from the 4th century was up in arms concerning the matter interpretation:

But the corrupters of the truth, who, incapable of submitting their reason to Holy Scripture, distort at will the meaning of the Holy Scriptures, pretend that these words mean matter. For it is matter, they say, which from its nature is without form and invisible,—being by the conditions of its existence without quality and without form and figure. (Basil Hexaemeron, Homily II)

My favorite example of the sloppy matter interpretation is taken from the drunken-opium induced proto-god of modern cosmology: Edgar Allan Poe. After his wife died Poe entered into a severe depression and penned a delusional book called Eureka: A Prose Poem. In this book he used a lousy translation of Gen 1:2, in particular tōhû wābōhû to help him dream up a primitive version of the ridiculous Big-Bang model:

We have attained a point where only Intuition can aid us: — but now let me recur to the idea which I have already suggested as that alone which we can properly entertain of intuition. It is but the conviction arising from those inductions or deductions of which the processes are so shadowy as to escape our consciousness, elude our reason, or defy our capacity of expression. With this understanding, I now assert — that an intuition altogether irresistible, although inexpressible, forces me to the conclusion that what God originally created — that that Matter which, by dint of his Volition, he first made from his Spirit, or from Nihility, could have been nothing but Matter in its utmost conceivable state of — what? — of Simplicity?

Let us now endeavor to conceive what Matter must be, when, or if, in its absolute extreme of Simplicity. Here the Reason flies at once to Imparticularity — to a particle — to one particle — a particle of one kind — of one character — of one nature — of one size — of one form — a particle, therefore, “without form and void” — a particle positively a particle at all points — a particle absolutely unique, individual, undivided, and not indivisible only because He who created it, by dint of his Will, can by an infinitely less energetic exercise of the same Will, as a matter of course, divide it. (Taken from Section 02)

It is good to note that Poe preceded LeMaitre's primeval atom hypothesis by about eighty years.  But notice how ridiculously Poe contradicts himself in the same sentence. He speculates a discrete particle of one form and yet magically 'without form and void'! An object cannot both have a form and not have a form. By definition an object has form. All types of matter, whether the fundamental objects constituting atoms or the atoms themselves this primal quality called FORM. And void refers to nothing.  So then did God disintegrate and then annihilate whatever it was that Earth refers to?

Poe got drunk, inhaled opium and fed off of bad translations. Poe's folly illustrates the faultiness of the 'formless', 'without form', 'shapeless', 'without shape' and 'void' translations of the Hebrew tōhû wābōhû.  These translations are heavily influenced by outdated Aristotelian and Scholastic philosophical notions. Philosophic notions such as matter and form and substance have no bloody place in Genesis 1.
   

In our times commentators continue to read space and matter into the first couple of verses of Genesis 1. Some examples include:

Rev. John F. McCarthy: On the plain and superficial level, the earth (haarets) in verse 1 means the land inhabited by man, whether it be thought of as a globe, a disk, or just a territory with as yet unknown borders. On the technical literal level it seems to mean primal matter as the ground of all future corporeal beings.

in another place

Taking, then, a model of modern physics, we can interpret the text as saying that, on the most elementary subatomic level, the "earth" spoken of here is the primal matter which was created as the "ground" of all more organized matter and which was infinitesimal, unstructured, minimally informed, and in a totally fluid state. (see his page:  http://www.rtforum.org/) 

McCarthy supports the concordist school of interpretation and it seems that he manipulates words at will. 

Pastor Bill Randles: The first verse of the Bible,is a summation of all that exists, for there is only Creator and creation. The infinite, personal, almighty, and Holy God made the heavens, (Space) and the Earth, (Matter) in the beginning, (Time). [...] The text simply tells us that when God created matter, it was originally in a formless state, waiting for his creative hand to give shape to it. Our physical world was created first in a formless state, and also in a state of darkness, for it pleased God to shape , and energize the world in later stages of Creation. (see his page:  http://billrandles.wordpress.com/2013/05/26/creation-ex-nihilo-genesis-1-pt-2/)

So Heaven refers to space and Earth to matter.  Space and matter are concepts.  God doesn't create concepts, He creates objects. Created objects relate via objects (mediators) and we conceptualize their relations.

Lakeside Ministries:  "WITHOUT FORM AND VOID" [. . .] THE ESSENTIAL MEANING, THEREFORE, IS: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth (or SPACE and MATTER), and the matter so created was at first unformed and uninhabited." [. . .] The created cosmos, as discussed earlier, was a tri-universe of TIME, SPACE, and MATTER. Initially there were no stars or planets, only the basic matter component of the space-matter-time continuum. The elements that were to be formed into the planet Earth were at first only elements, not yet formed but nevertheless comprising the basic matter- the "DUST" of the earth. (reference:  http://lakesideministries.com/1stCovenant/Genesis/04_GenSect0102_Creation_Itself.htm)

So the Middle Eastern Hebrew author conveniently conceived of a tri-universe of Time, Space and Matter---all Western concepts.        

Some few have even tried to fit the Big-Bang into the first three verses (e.g. Gerald Schroeder). The Earth refers to the universe or prime matter (whatever that is), tohu and bohu refers to the state of prime matter, the darkness over faces of waters refers to space-time, the Spirit is moving over space-time and then Bang! Flash! There is light. Out go the discrete photon particles which miraculously stretch as waves. About 13.8 billion years later the scientists detect them with their grand technology and some interpreters proclaim to the world that Genesis 1 was always right after all!!! We have proof in the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation. And so on. Apparently the sacred author studied mathematical physics and knew that relativity breaks down at the quantum level. He was a follower of Lemaitre, Einstein, Hubble, and the gang.  Maybe he built a satellite.  Or perhaps he had a vision of the Big-Bang. What do you think?

Personal intentions aside, I think that those who read in prime matter or Big-Bang in the second verse of Genesis join the ranks of drunks, charlatans and frauds. There is no justification for reading the creation of matter into the first sequence of Genesis 1 period. It is an unsound interpretation. Sober minds snub their noses at these ridiculous interpretations.  They betray a lack of humility and respect for the Sacred Script.  For whatever reason men try to wed Genesis 1 to the physics and/or philosophy of the day.  Or they get delusional.  Instead of coming up with creative solutions with what has been given in the Text they get delusions of grandeur.  Of course there are also those at the other end of the spectrum who sell out completely.  

Conclusion of the Above  

Throughout history matter has been ill-defined. It is a joke of a word. People, including scientists, use it for anything and everything. The sacred author could have cared less about matter. To imagine the sacred author thought of or saw the creation of what would have been to him unknown material and then describe it using figures is an unacceptable stretch of the imagination. Rather, the planet Earth is the important object to the sacred author since this is the location where all the supernatural events that he relates take place. And it is important to us since we are conceived and born on Earth, live on Earth and will certainly die on Earth.

A central theme of Genesis 1 is the Earth.  This does not imply that the Earth is the center of the universe. This was read into the Text by the ancients. Genesis 1 has nothing to do with physics or philosophy, Greeks or ANE myths, moderns or ancients, believers or atheists, medievals or post-Moderns, rabbis or priests, Popes or gurus, creation ex nihilo or an eternal universe, Big-Bang or the cosmological principle. Genesis 1 has everything to do with a miraculous course of events God wrought on Earth in the past and showed to the sacred author who in-errantly recorded them in the third person.  That is all.  

The Definition of Matter

I now want to share the definition of the universe and matter that I have inherited in order to confirm that there is no possible way the sacred author could be referring to these in the first and second verse of the Bible.

The universe is a concept. It is a binary conceptual system that relates space and matter. Space is a sheer concept that refers to nothing in existence. It is all 'where' and no 'what'. Space is distance.  We discovered that space is in fact nothing when we launched the space probes. There is no objective aether-medium out there. There is no such thing as space-time. Space does not have a bloody form and neither does time.  Objects do not occupy space or time. We imagine space and time, and then hopefully define these words but objects are just there, they cannot be defined.

Matter is a concept that relates the fundamental, microscopic, invisible objects of the universe. The fundamental physical objects are structured into atoms.

I hold to Gaede's EM Rope Hypothesis and Thread Theory.*** In Gaede's Model there is no such thing as discrete quantum particles. The supposition is that all the atoms of the universe are formed by and connected by a taut two strand continuous rope-like structure affectionately called the EM rope. The EM ropes are comprised of an Electric Thread and a Magnetic Thread that run anti-parallel twisting around each other like a strand of DNA. The E and M threads are, so to speak, the yin and yang of the universe. 

EM ropes are continuously induced to rotation of various link-lengths (frequency) and link-heights (amplitude) by the pumping and vibrating of the atoms formed into them.  Atoms exchange or give and receive links of EM rope by expansion and contraction. The EM ropes torque light signals. In Gaede's book energy is defined as "an aggregate of torque signals traveling radially along each of the ropes that connect an atom with the remaining atoms in the Universe." (WGDE, p. 276)

Mike Huttner's depiction of Gaede's hypothesis

The Definition of Matter: the relation of the fundamental, microscopic, invisible objects of the universe. The two fundamental objects are an Electric Thread and a Magnetic Thread. The E and M Threads are in reality a single closed loop thread woven into two fundamental structural units that are the EM ropes and hydrogen atoms.  The distinction of the E and M threads lies in the direction of their separation at the atomic perimeters.  

The EM ropes are the missing dark matter of the universe.  They physically bind all atoms.  They are the physical entities responsible for the gravitational effects. They do not emit or absorb EM radiation since they are the entities conveying signals between atoms while mediating gravity. You cant see that which mediates light itself. It just happens that these also mediate gravity. 

All the EM ropes of the universe converge forming all atoms. The magnetic threads arc out at the atomic perimeter forming a definite physical surface. The balloon-like shell of separated M threads is known as the electron. On the other hand the electric threads go straight to the center criss-crossing in a structure that resembles koosh ball. These are the protons. So a koosh ball of electric threads is cocooned by an interlaced shell of magnetic threads. Any two of the gazillion E and M threads re-twist at the atomic perimeter and 'extend out' connecting all atoms of the universe.

One of Gaede's basic illustrations of his hydrogen atom

Gaede's Proton resembles a koosh ball nestled in an electron cacoon  

The fundamental objects of the universe or if you prefer the 'building blocks' of matter are shaped as an Electric thread and a Magnetic thread. These are supposed to be single continuous looped thread that weaves all EM ropes that separate into all atoms. Perhaps God created this immeasurably vast single looped thread from nothing and shaped it into an energetic network of atoms in a miracle. The electric and magnetic threads are 3D physical shapes (not fields) that exist separately only where they separate to form atoms. Some of the M threads are so slackened at the atomic perimeter that they fan in an immense arc that is responsible for magnetic effects. Where they are not separated the 'yin and yang' exist only as torquing EM rope. 

Thus there are two basic units of matter namely the hydrogen atom and the EM rope. Hydrogen atoms are one type of fundamental unit of matter since they are woven by Electric threads and Magnetic threads. EM ropes connected all atoms is the other type of fundamental unit of matter since they are Electric threads twisted around Magnetic threads. Atoms jump inducing the EM rope to torque continuously conveying signals to all atoms of the network. This is light phenomenon. Relative to the H-atom the torquing EM rope is for all practical purposes a surface-less type matter yet nevertheless it is a 3D shape comprised of twisting E and M thread orders of magnitude thinner than the H-atom, perhaps at what the quantum mechanics call the fine structure. The E thread has a shape, the M thread has a form, the EM rope has a shape, and the Hydrogen atoms and all atoms have forms. Matter without form or formless matter is an oxymoron since Matter is a concept; concepts by definition have no form.  Also the fundamental objects and units of the concept Matter all have shapes.

Heavier atomic elements form in stars via fusion and compression processes. Different types of atoms bond in the processes of stellar evolution or through other processes.

Neutrons are the cross points of EM ropes to all atoms. Neutrons are the convergences of gazillions of EM ropes coming from all atoms of the universe. In interstellar and intergalactic space the torquing EM ropes from all stars or galaxies converge and spontaneously reconfigure into hydrogen atoms, convey torsion signals and then reconfigure back to neutrons. One type of fundamental unit of matter spontaneously forms into another type of fundamental unit of matter. This is Gaede's correction of spontaneous particle/anti-particle production. Discrete particles are not continuously created and annihilated, rather crisscrosses of EM rope spontaneously reconfigure to hydrogen atoms and back again. Perhaps this occurrence is a remnant of what God did in the beginning of matter for it is seemingly un-explainable. In any case the matter of the universe is constant. It neither increases nor decreases.  The network is comprised of gazillions of EM ropes constantly induced to torque by the pumping of gazillions of atoms they separate to form. EM rope has the unique property that allows it to superimpose. This is called light on light.  Light is able to pass through light without interference.   

Universe: space + matter. Space contours the Electromagnetic thread, EM ropes and atoms. Space refers to nothing in existence. God did not create space. God created the objects of matter and angels. Space is not a physical object that can expand, stretch, accelerate, etc. and neither is the universe.

These are some of the understandings of the universe that I proudly adopt from Gaede. The whole point in sharing these is to showcase Gaede's EM rope hypothesis and Thread Theory as well as confirm that God and the sacred author could not have possibly described creation ex nihilo or prime matter in the first and second verses of Genesis. Even if you hold to the ridiculous Big-Bang and Standard Model you would be dreaming if you think you could convince any sound mind that the first three verses of Genesis 1 refers to it. 

In my opinion the angels were created simultaneous to the fundamental object(s) of matter thus they are not fit candidates to be drawn out of few verses of Genesis 1. There are nine choirs of angels and they number probably close to a trillion. They have a vast and complex history that even the prophets and sacred authors know little about. How is one in their sane mind supposed to read the angels creation and history in the first few verses of Genesis 1??? These are rather simple yet no less subtle sentences, but reading the good angels and fallen angels and Hell and the universe and prime matter and Big-Bang, stars and galaxies in this context would be an absurd juggling act which any sane jury would condemn and convict.

Earth

The events of Genesis 1 are frames of the Universal Movie. And yet they were not a result of Mother Nature, but of God emitting His Spirit and supernaturally transforming the face of the Earth. He initiated an exclusive relationship with the Earth that is not found among all the stars of the universe. God accomplished the impossible.

The subject of Gen 1:2 is planet Earth. The Earth of the second verse is not a figure referring to matter or anything else other than the ancient astronomical object under our feet. The second verse picks up with the Earth of the first verse.  She is the new subject and the sacred author adds additional information and modification concerning her.

My speculation is that the Earth of the first verse and second verse is an old dark star that naturally transitioned up to the time when the Spirit was emitted. The assumption that the Earth is the cinder of what was once a star has rarely been suggested through history but it is much more reasonable than the solar nebular assumption. Perhaps it is even suggested in this lofty sequence from the Book of Job.  God speaks to Job:

"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the Earth?

Tell me, if you possess understanding!
Who set its measurements – if you know –
or who stretched a measuring line across it?
​​​​​​​On what were its bases set,
or who laid its cornerstone –
​​​​​​​when the morning stars sang in chorus,
and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (NET)

The formation of the Earth seems to be associated with a time of morning stars perhaps referring to the first stars.

In any case sacred author sets up his story perhaps trillions of years after creation ex nihilo at the previously stated object, the Earth. He did not necessarily have to know that the Earth was a transformed star. This is my interpretive theory to help shed light on the first and second verses of Genesis 1. In the second verse the sacred author speaks of the Earth as an evident object of anterior creation.  What he knew of the Earth's history prior to what he was shown is a moot point.  All he stated was that God had created a definite object he traced as Earth.  I think the sacred author saw the Earth in a vision as if orbiting her like a satellite. He saw her face like we see the face of the Moon from Earth, only he had a closer view. The word he chose to describe the full view of her face was the mystic tōhû wābōhû.  

There are all sorts of talk about the grammar of the second verse and how it fits into sequence of the first three verses e.g. disjunctive clause, circumstantial clause, parenthetical clause. Perhaps the insight that circumscribes all the grammar talk is the suggestion by Westermann that the second verse is a ‘this and not yet that’ description. The Earth is described as she appeared just prior to the main event or the light-event as I call it. The sacred author was not given a prophetic movie of the Earth's entire history.  Instead he was given a some frames of the Earth just prior to God entering the movie.  God was about to manifest Himself to the Universe by transfiguring the Earth via the missive Spirit. He was about to place His seal on the Earth establishing a dynamic relation which has endured to this day. The Spirit was primed to work the Earth and get her atoms pumping and jumping in the cold darkness of interstellar space. It was a very exciting time, and the prophet was fortunate to have been given sight of this great miracle.

The Earth was at that time an old dark star metamorphosed from its younger phase of fusion and compression.  Earth is a cinder of what was once a star!!! In her young phase she welded her solid iron core via intrinsic light, gravitational, electric and magnetic phenomenon. She then shed hers outer layers, cooled and continued to compress (as all stars do). She synthesized molecules and leaked gas in her galactic rotation. She probably passed through several dense interstellar clouds which atomic elements and molecules diversified her makeup. The elements of her essence synthesized and solidified. As she cooled she probably synthesized H2O (Wolynski) helping form her crust or perhaps assimilated some of her H2O from a dense interstellar medium for water is abundant between stars.

Earth was a wandering star. In its latter stages of development the Earth may have even orbited a younger star besides the Sun. But when God initiated the first described event of our Gen 1 story the Earth was swinging about halfway out from the galactic core in the vicinity of a newer star known as the Sun.  God will move the Earth to revolve around Sun later in the story. But when God was about to initiate the light-event the Earth had some sort of core, mantle, crust, a water supply and either no atmosphere or a thin atmosphere. And she was not a ball of chaos. She was slumbering in the cold darkness of space.  Some of her surface froze over and she appeared as an astonishing-desert or wasteland.  She was an ice planet. Not a lot of activity was happening on her surface. There were no living entities. She was waiting to receive the stimulation of the Spirit and glow in the dark!

The seer saw her full face in a prophecy, was mystified and came up with a playful word to first describe her, namely: tōhû wābōhû. There are some excellent scholarly studies of this gem of a Hebrew word and I will raise a few points in the upcoming posts.  

*** For more on Gaede's thought read his book:  Why God Doesn't Exist, visit his webpage youstupidrelativist.com, read many of his other articles on the internet or join the Facebook groups Rational Scientific Method and Rope Hypothesis.  I do not agree with ALL of his thought but his physics is the cream of the crop.  He has quantum mechanics and mathematical physicists with all their irrational assumptions and theories by the throat.  I am very proud to have learned his physics even though I respectfully disagree with some of his thoughts.      

Translations of the Gen 1:2 Tōhû wābōhû

Tōhû wābōhû is one of my favorite words of the entire Bible. It is wrapped in the mystique of the ages.

The Earth was what???

Latin Versions and Derivatives:

inanis et vacua (Vulgate)

void and empty (Douay Rheims)

empty and unoccupied (CPDV)

idel ond æmti (AElfric, Old Anglo-Saxon)

idol and void (Wycliffe)

Greek Versions and Derivatives:

aoratoj kai akatskeuastoj --- invisible and unformed (LXX w/ literal Eng trans.)

kenwma kai ouqen --- empty and nothing (Aquila)

qen kai ouqen --- nothing and nothing (Theodotion)

argon kai adiakriton --- unproductive and indistinguishable (Symmachus)

unsightly and unfinished (Brenton's English Septuagint)

Hebrew Derivatives:

chaos and vacancy (Hebrew Interlinear CHES 2.0 Version)

formless and void (NASB)

formless void (NJB)

formless wasteland (NAB Vatican Version)

without shape and empty (NET)

waste and void (Young's Literal)

without form and void (KJV & RSV)

formless and empty (WEB)

Foreign Language Bibles:

desordenada y vacia (Spanish, La Santa Biblia)

vide et deserte (French, La Sainte Bible)

afluniaidd a gwag (Welsh Bible)

Scholars:

astonishingly empty (Rashi)

completely empty (Rashbam)

empty waste (Ibn Ezra)

completely prime matter (Ramban)

desert waste (Claude Westermann)

haltos et gestaltos (Gorg)
contingent potentiality in a potentiality of being (Fabre d'Olivet)

hodgepodge (Jack Sasson)

mish-mash (William P. Brown suggestion)

welter and waste (Robert Alter)

chaos and watery chaos (Albright)

uninhabitable and unproductive (absence of fauna and flora: Roberto Ouro)

desert-like and empty or desolate and uninhabited (Tsumura)

Scholarly Notes:

"barrenness of the earth before anything grew on it" (N.H. Tur Sinai)

"a state of confused matter ... with no differentiation or organization" (U. Cassuto)

Targum Neof according to G. Anderson: "This text first reproduces the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew pair tohu wabohu and then interprets them. The first term, tohu, is interpreted to mean absence of faunal life; the second term, bohu, the absence of floral life." (from 'The Interpretation of Genesis 1 in the Targums', CBQ, 1990 p. 23)

My Translation:

astonishing-desert or astonishing-wasteland

Some Remarks:

What a motley list of translations!!! I am against the gap theory so any translation and interpretation suggesting this line of thought I am against. I am against the interpretive notions of creation ex nihilo for this context. I am against the Big-Bang or any cosmological or philosophical system read into this text.

And I am in strong opposition to translation rendering 'formless' or 'without form' or 'shapeless' or 'without shape'. These translations are oxymora. They are influenced by outmoded Aristotelian and Scholastic philosophies.  They are fodder for troubled philosophers and opium induced drunks. The subject of the verse, the Earth, is a noun of reality. It is an object, an astronomical object. By definition it has form or shape. The Earth had a form long before the main light-event. The prophet looked at an object that has a form or shape. In this same vein I am opposed to the translations which include 'invisible' or 'nothing' or 'void'. Again the prophet saw an astronomical object so these would be non-nonsensical.

I am also opposed to the philosophical translations that suggest this verse refers to prime matter or any sort of philosophical translation. Sacred authors and prophets do not fop around with philosophy. A prime matter translation and interpretation destroys the context. What is prime matter? Define prime matter ________. Do you really think the ancient Hebrew had any notion of prime matter or saw prime matter??? Does prime matter have a surface of waters???

I am also strongly opposed to the 'chaos' or 'Chaoskampf" translations and interpretations. These associate Genesis 1 with the Ancient Near Eastern myths. They read a struggle against evil into the Text. Anyone who teaches Chaos in relation to Genesis 1 to unwitting students should be demoted to janitor so that they can struggle against the crap that they love.

And I am against the idea that this verse directly refers to Hell or fallen angels.

I tend to favor the abiotic translations and interpretations. The Earth that the sacred author describes is obviously without living entities whether fauna or flora or microorganisms. These are narrated as coming to be within the light-event. But this line of thought doesn't resolve the mystique of the word. What exactly did the sacred author see and then describe? How can one reconcile the notions of desert, desolation, aridity, idleness, emptiness, etc with that of a water covered surface? Can one make sense of this seeming contradiction? I think one can.

Earth was and still is a very old dark star or black dwarf that naturally transitioned for countless years prior to the main event prophetically recorded in Genesis 1.***  Planets are cooling and compressing stars with vast histories.  The object that the prophet looked at and later described was what can be called an 'ice planet' or 'ice world'. The Earth was slumbering in cold interstellar space away from newer active stars.  She was not far from the newer Sun and yet not yet orbiting the Sun. Her surface was icy H20 and volatiles with ancient subsurface liquid oceans (or abysses). The subsurface abysses were heated by her hot core that stimulated mantle and crust. Like Antarctica she was dry and arid yet still had an immense water supply. Her surface was idle and barren.  The Spirit was about to activate her surface in the light-event.  But upon first impression, the prophet was mystified by what he saw. This is what led him to trace and utter the Hebrew word wrapped in the mystique of the ages:

tōhû wābōhû

to be continued . . . 

Quote of the Day From Stanley Jaki's Genesis 1 Through the Ages

Concordism kept a hold on the minds of most Catholic theologians and in fact became a quasi-official position in Catholic seminaries.  Concordism, which produced an immense literature, fell merely in disfavor with the publication on November 18, 1893, of Leo XIII’s Encyclical Providentissimus Deus on the interpretation of the Scriptures.  The Pope emphasized that the inspired authors did not mean to teach about the workings of nature and therefore no “real conflict could arise between the theologian and the physicist as long as both remained within the confines of their respective methods.”  It was left to the theologians to be specific about the sense in which Moses’ message was literal, that is, genuinely historical.

As will be seen, the subsequent grappling of the theologians and exegetes with this task did not improve a bit on the dismal picture that had emerged from their previous efforts.  No one at that moment painted that picture more realistically than F. Hummelauer, Jesuit professor of Old Testament exegesis at the Gregorianum, who helped the Pope in drafting that Encyclical:  “In the end, what is left of so many systems of explanation?  Diluviansim is guilty of ignoring the geological evidence; restitutionsim, whose aim it was to satisfy the geologists, is rejected by them; periodism does violence to the text, poetism to the context, mythism to the idea of revelation, whereas idealism is destroyed by its own instrinsic absurdity.  All is darkness and chaos, when let light come forth at long last!”  (From Genesis 1 Through the Ages by Stanley Jaki p. 238-239; internal Hummelauer quote from Commentarisus in Genesim p. 68)

The Formation of Our Modern Atmosphere in the Sacred Scripts

The Modern Atmosphere

When I use the term 'modern atmosphere' I am referring to the atmosphere shaped by God in the light-event described in Genesis 1:

There shall be an expanse in the midst of the waters.
And it shall come to be dividing waters toward waters.
And God made the essence of an expanse.
And God caused it to divide between waters that were below the expanse to waters that were above the expanse. (my interpretive translation)

Prior to this event (a sub-event of the light-event) there was a series of outer layers since the Earth is an old dark star. As a star evolves it has different types of outer layers for example the relatively young Sun has photosphere, chromosphere, and corona. The Earth once had these type of outer layers yet when God entered the Universal Movie and transfigured the Earth's surface I guess the Earth had a thin atmosphere like some of the planets and moons of the solar system. Subsequent to the light-event exists the essence of the modern atmosphere. I do not know when the light-event occurred in relation to today. It could have been two, three, or four billion years ago. Yet note my understanding of the Earth. I believe Earth is a transformed star thus it could be in the tens of billions of years old. So when I say the modern atmosphere I refer to the essential atmosphere that has existed since God changed the face of the Earth. It is relatively new.

Once I understood the depths of idiocy the established scientific community can fall into, I abandoned all their dates and most their hypotheses, and theories. All they have are statements of facts, assumptions and speculations in an attempt to fill in vast gaps of the Universal Movie. Their speculations tend to be biased toward pre-established theories such as Father Big-Bang, its son the solar nebular hypothesis, plate tectonics, iron catastrophe, and now this new speculation I have run into called the Oxygen Catastrophe.

Mainstream 'scientists' are predisposed to prove, string together and/or reinforce established hypotheses and theories taught in the profit-seeking corporations called universities. They also tend to convert theories as well as hypothesis into facts of the Universal Movie (that is all physical objects that ever existed and all their phenomena). Theories or assumptions or even statements of facts are never facts of the Universal Movie. Physics and Philosophy does not deal in facts. All these fields have are statements of facts, assumptions and speculations filling in the intricate and immense gaps of the Universal Movie. A statement of facts is petty compared to the reality of a single frame of the Universal Movie. But from their statements of facts, suppositions (hypothesis) and explanations (theory) flows a conclusion that is according to reason possible or impossible but never, I repeat never a fact. Some Mainstream scientists insinuate that their hypothesis or theories or conclusions are facts of the Universal Movie. They convert an assumption or a theory into a fact and get awarded for this nonsense.

I do not reject all of mainstream's statements of facts, assumptions, and theories but I have lost all respect for them. Thus I decided to start from scratch. If they want to believe that our crystalline atmosphere formed as a combination of gas left over from the Sun's formation, volcanic out-gassing, asteroids and comets smashing into Earth, and little blobs producing oxygen, then they can go to God with that. I'm not going to God with their hogwash. I start from Sacred Scripture and use some non-mainstream works of physics to help guide my interpretive concepts of Genesis 1, 2, 3. Some examples of these are Gaede's Thread Theory, Abruzzo's Stellar Transformation Hypothesis, Wolynski's thought, as well as others. I am not out to provide a physical mechanism to explain a miraculous event wrought by God, or to 'scientifically prove' what God did. A miraculous event is supra-rational. According to reason it is impossible.

But I allow some choice works in physics to guide my interpretation of the Sacred Scripts. For example I assume the Earth is an old dark star. I suppose that it did not form within a disk of gas and dust revolving around the Sun. I assume that it had a vast history prior to God transfiguring it and moving it into a rotation around the newer Sun. I use this assumption to explain the prophetic descriptions Genesis 1 and state my conclusion or beliefs.

The Making of the Modern Atmosphere

I believe God first shaped the modern outer layers of the Earth. God emitted the Spirit to an old astronomical object. The Spirit stimulated its surface that contained a water supply. In doing this God made the essence of our modern atmosphere. Since then the Earthen sphere has been systematically sustained by the fallen evolutionary cycles of the plants and animals. The miracle of our sphere's transformation from out of the old surface is described in Genesis 1 but I think it is also described in some other elegant Sacred Scripts. And so I would like to delve into these. The Scripts are a part of the Books of Job and Proverbs.

Job 26:10

Let's start with the verse from Job, which is said to be the oldest Book of the Bible. Blessed Anne says that Job's servants recorded the events of Job's life and Job's wisdom on bark. Job was a great Saint in frequent mystical communication with God.*  And of course he had great adventures and trials. Interestingly, Blessed Anne mentions that his books were passed down to Moses through Abraham and then to Solomon. Both Moses and Solomon reformed the Book of Job. Within the mystery of Inspiration they edited and added some of their own wisdom and so the Book of Job came to be a Sacred Script.**

Blessed Anne prophetic descriptions lead me to believe that it was either Moses or Solomon was was the seer and writer of Genesis 1 since the below verses I will examine are clearly supplements to the event described in Genesis 1.

I forego traditional translations and interpretations with my own:

He encircled a bound over the face of the waters as far as the end of light beside darkness.
The pillars of the Heaven are shaken and they are amazed at His rebuke.

This prophetic Script describes an event. The event is the miraculous transformation of the Earth's modern atmosphere. The key to understanding this script is visualization. An interpreter could either visualize the occurrence by imagining himself standing on the surface of the Earth or by imagining himself in outer space with the Earth facing him. I prefer the latter since this is the view that I think the seers had of this event.

The first frame of the movie is the Earth as an old dark star with a surface water supply. Like some of the moons of our solar system it had little or no outer layers of gas. But imagine what the Earth would be without the atmosphere and without Sunlight. That is the first frame of the movie just prior to when God transfigured the face of the Earth. It was a rogue-like planet not yet revolving around the Sun nor with layers of gas enveloping it. It was surrounded by little or nothing. Space is nothing. It is not an object that conveys EM torsion signals. Only atoms convey signals to all other atoms by giving and receiving links of EM 'rope'.

The 'bound' of the 10th verse and the Heaven of the 11th verse are associated. They both refer to the modern atmosphere. The 'encirclement' is the miraculous formation of the modern outer gaseous layers. God shaped a new bound for the astronomical object Earth. He diffused pillars of atoms from the aquatic and lifeless surface of the ancient Earth and wrapped these around the Earth. Thus once formed; the new bound is over the face of the waters. The new bound envelops the Earth and extends to a distance where light phenomenon ends beside the darkness of outer space. In the event of the modern atmosphere's transformation God lit up the face of the Earth by stimulating atoms of the surface waters. This is a superficial meaning of "There shall be light."

The Spirit stimulated the the Earth's face in several locations and in this the atoms of these locations burst up excited; sending light signals. If you saw this event from outer space you would see the Earths surface suddenly light up from several locations. The Earth changed color due to higher frequencies and different amps conveyed by the atoms of her surface.  If you saw this event from the Earth's surface you would see luminous atoms erupting from the surface like a geyser and then perpendicular bands spreading out from the geysers in all directions. Thus the Earth is encircled or enveloped by a new bound: layers of gas or the atmosphere. The pillars did not last long. They were immediately rebuked, a figure referring to a beating of the atoms. The Spirit beat them or diffused them in a stylistic manner.

The agitated atoms burst forth vertically from the Earth and the Spirit divided them around in all directions as if encircling a head with a luminous bandages. The luminous bands encircling the Earth end beside the darkness of outer space. They are the new bound separating the Earth from its immediate surrounding. In the same course of events the Earth was placed in orbit around the Sun and the atmosphere changed color to blue via the solar light signals. Since this supernatural phenomenon; most of the diffused atoms have been held in by natural gravitational tug and these are recycled by way of plant and animal activity from the land/water surface.

Now think of the atmosphere as it exists today. The Earth's atmosphere is a gaseous enclosure of solar light phenomenon. It is a canopy of sunlight where molecules and atoms relay solar signals in all directions. The solar light display unique to this planet ends at the outer layers where atoms deplete. Beside the atoms of our atmosphere's outer layer is the darkness of nothing.

In Gaede's Theory of Threads all the atoms of the Earth are connected to all the atoms of the Sun via an electric thread and a magnetic fiber twisted anti-parallel in a rectilinear DNA shaped object. The EM rope is taut, rectilinear, microscopic and not visible since it mediates light phenomenon. The solar atoms jump and vibrate at the expense of the EM rope.  The solar atoms convey torsion signals of various link lengths and amplitudes via the EM rope inducing the connected atoms of the Earth to jump and relay or re-transmit the signals to all other atoms of the Universe. The first Earthen atoms to interfere the solar signals and re-transmit them are the atoms of the atmosphere. The relay puts on a 'light show'. During the day many atmospheric atoms relay light signals in a link length that corresponds to the color blue. A more intense blue color corresponds to higher links (amplitude). The atoms of the atmosphere relay blue link-lengths or varying intensity to our eyes. The solar signals induce our atmospheric atoms to jump and relay signals thus there occurs a ping pong effect of solar signals; a re-transmission of the light signals between all the atoms of the Earth, first and foremost the atoms of our atmosphere. When you stand on the Earth on a clear sunny day most of the solar signals do not rotate uninterruptedly from the atoms of the Sun to the atoms of your eyes. Most are relayed in all directions (scattered) by the transparent gaseous atoms that make up our atmosphere in a ping pong effect that reaches your eyes via the EM ropes connecting all atoms.

The atmosphere is a canopy of light phenomenon: a true light horizon. Beyond the light-boundary of our modern atmosphere is the darkness of outer space. The atoms of our sphere thin out to a layer where there are little or no atoms (the exosphere) that relay the solar light signals to the land/water surface thus there is the darkness of outer space. Our atmosphere is truly a boundary between light phenomenon and the the lack thereof that is the darkness of outer space. God encircled a new bound over the face of the waters toward a completion of light phenomenon next to lack of light phenomenon.

The interpretive mistake of this Job verse has always seemed to associate this Script with the skyline: the imaginary line that separates earth from sky (synonym: the horizon). But this is a great mistake. The verse describes what God DID. The encircled bound is an ancient event. The Earth's surface molecules expanded outward in the shape of pillars as a result of a miraculous act of God and a new horizon was established out from pillars by none other than God. This new bound is our modern atmosphere. God expanded Earth's horizon by erupting her water supply and beating the erupted molecules in all directions over the surface. This event is the second Divine phenomenon of the ancient light-event described in Genesis 1. 

I love the way Blessed Anne describes this event.  I think she saw this same event in her mystical experiences. Keep in mind her supposed locating of seeing this event:

Immediately after the prayer of the faithful choirs and that movement in the Godhead, I saw below me, not far from and to the right of the world of shadows, another dark globe arise [the Earth].

I fixed my eyes steadily upon it. I beheld it as if in movement, growing larger and larger, as it were, bright spots breaking out upon it and encircling it like luminous bands. (Mysteries of the Old Testament)

With these few words Blessed Anne defies thousands of years of stodgy and unimaginative interpretations.

The Spirit stimulated the molecules and atoms of the Earth's facial waters in several locations and in this He literally lit up the Earth's face for a brief period. He broke out the water supply from the planetary surface and guided it out from the several geyser like formations--in all directions in a stylistic manner as if encircling a head with luminous bandages. Thus our modern atmosphere was shaped. If you saw this event from outer space you would see the Earths surface suddenly light up from several locations which burst outward. The surface locations from where the pillars erupted were miraculously transformed into land masses as the atmosphere was wrapped above. The Spirit got Earth's atoms jumping and vibrating. Since this supernatural phenomenon; most of the diffused atoms have been held in by gravitational pull mediated by the EM rope binding all atoms of the core, mantle and surface to the atoms of the atmosphere. The strength of number and angles of the EM ropes connecting the atoms keeps the gaseous layers from escaping into outer space. And they are recycled by way of plant and animal activity from the land/water surface.

Proverbs 3:19-20

The Lord, in wisdom, founded the Earth, He established the Heaven in understanding.
In His knowledge the ancient oceans burst forth and the clouds are dripping dew. (My translation)

The Hebrew shamayim in the nineteenth verse is the atmosphere of the Earth since Solomon began this little sequence by stating the Earth. In this context the Hebrew word shamayim should be translated in the singular since the referent is a singular object as in Genesis 1:6-8. Solomon associates the Heaven with the eruption of the ancient oceans (plural in the Hebrew) and the clouds dripping dew. The ancient oceans reference the various water supplies sitting on the Earth prior to the light-event. The Latin Vulgate uses the word 'eruperunt'. The Spirit caused the ancient oceans to erupt: to burst forth. He did this by His Divine Power. The Spirit mediated commands given to Him by the Father and the Son.  He did not invoke any natural physical mechanism to induce the surface water supply to erupt and spread out around over the Earth. The aquatic Earthen surface suddenly erupted in several locations as if their were immense geysers and circuited in bands in a miracle; a supra-rational event, a supernatural event. It is an event that defies physics. The Spirit accomplished the impossible. With Mother Nature all things are not possible. With God all good things are possible, especially the shaping of our wonderful atmosphere.

The Spirit enclosed the Earth with the ejected H2O. The Spirit moved the erupted molecules over the Earth as if He held a brush and the molecules were His paint. In this was made the first version of our modern atmosphere. It was a great miracle. He may have split some of the H2O into H and O. The O synthesized into O2 and the hydrogen may have eventually photoevaporated into outer space. He may have also kicked up some other molecules and atoms sitting on the surface in addition to the H20. Bear in mind: the Spirit renovated the entire surface of the Earth. I do not know what all the elements and molecules sitting on the Earth's surface at the time. And I do not know what the end product was of the light-event was in terms of surface elements and chemical compounds. Blessed Anne said that Adam's body was formed in a yellow mound of Earth. No animals and plants refurbished the surface up to that time since the Spirit created them in the same event. In any case perhaps there was a substantial amount of ammonia mixed into the waters of the surface. Or there may have been a thin atmosphere of ammonia at the time. And so some of the split O2 oxidized the ammonia to nitrogen and more H20.  There may have also been methane and other chemicals but the speculative chemical reactions really do not matter to me since the incident was a miracle.

Solomon associates the eruption of the abyss with the beaten atoms (Hebrew shachaq translated by me into clouds) dripping with dew. This is a logical sequence. The eruption of the waters coinciding with their circuitous division over land and sea results in the first drops of dew back down to the land and sea.  In Genesis 2 it is said that it had not yet rained yet the fall-out of the the ejection and spread of the waters were present when the Spirit moved to create Adam in the same main light-event:

and no shrub of the field is yet in the earth, and no herb of the field yet sprouteth, for Jehovah God hath not rained upon the earth, and a man there is not to serve the ground, 6 and a mist goeth up from the earth, and hath watered the whole face of the ground. (YLT)

Proverbs 8:27

​​​​​​​In His establishment of the Heaven there I was, in His delineation of a circuit over the face of the abyss. (My translation)

God delineates a circuit over the surface water supplies. The circuit refers to the course of the molecules divided from the erupted pillars in a stylistic manner. Blessed A.C. Emmerich described them as bands but Solomon describes them here as circuits. There is no reason in hell to understand these words rigidly or immaturely. God traced gaseous atoms in all directions using the matter of the pillars that erupted vertically out from the surface. He moved them from the pillars in a roundabout journey over the surface of the Earth. Obviously the pillars were dissipated by the circuit of the atoms. The circular bands essentially covered the entire land and sea mass in the shape of a sphere since the old dark star was spherical prior to the event. The formation of the modern atmosphere was the definition of a new gaseous boundary for the entire astronomical object. God diffused some of the ancient water supply upwards and spread the diffusing waters all around. In these verses one has to think vertical then horizontal. Or up then sideways. Or up then north-south-east-west in all directions. The waters jumped perpendicular to the surface then circuited in all directions by the power of the Spirit.

The sacred authors were not Greeks. They related the formation of the Earth's transparent sphere in their own words. They had bird's eye views of the event thus the Genesis 1 author's description of a division below and above must be envisioned as if seeing the event from outer space. He sees pillars of waters erupting towards him and then waters dividing out above and below the tops of the pillars in a circuit over the old face of the Earth. The Genesis 1 author's description is vague enough to suggest all directions from the expanse of the waters.

The word face and circuit imply a spherical object, yet the prophets observed the Earth changing as if from outer space. The Earth was facing them and they related the events from this observation. It would be impossible to view the entire sphere changing since the back side was not facing them in their prophetic experience. Similar with Blessed Anne. She had a prophetic bird's eye view as if from outer space. They all used words chosen from their prophetic experience. And I think God wrought this event in an intricate or stylistic manner. He wasn't sloppy about it. Thus words 'delineated a circuit' or 'encircled a bound' are fit.

*   Job was unspeakably gentle, affable, just, and benevolent. He assisted all in need. He was, too, exceedingly pure and very familiar with God, who communicated with him . . . (Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, Mysteries of the Old Testament)

** Blessed Anne: "The history of Job, together with his dialogues with God, was circumstantially written down by two of his most trusty servants who seemed to be his stewards. They wrote upon bark, and from Jobs own dictation. These two servants were named respectively Hai and Uis, or Ois. These narratives were held very sacred by Jobs descendants. They passed from generation to generation down to Abraham. In the school of Rebecca, the Canaanites were instructed in them on account of the lessons of submission under trials from God that they inculcated. Through Jacob and Joseph, they descended to the children of Israel in Egypt. Moses collected and arranged them differently for the use of the Israelites during their servitude in Egypt and their painful wanderings in the wilderness; for they contained many details that might not have been understood, and which would have been of no service in his time. But Solomon again entirely remodelled them, omitting many things and inserting many others of his own. And so, this once authentic history became a sacred book made up of the wisdom of Job, Moses, and Solomon.

One can now only with difficulty trace the particular history of Job, for the names of cities and nations were assimilated to those of the land of Canaan, on which account Job came to be regarded as an Edomite." (Mysteries of the Old Testament)

Genesis 1:1 In a beginning (II)

Gen 1:1 In a beginning (Part I)

I found another who adheres to the translation:

'In a beginning'

for the first word of Genesis 1 and Bible. It comes from the book titled Intercourses in the Book of Genesis by R. Gilboa. This book is a simplified version of his P.H.D. thesis presented to the University of Manchester and published in 1998. He seemed to be doing a doctorate in Biblical Hebrew. Here is an abstract from the book:

The very first word in Genesis indicates a certain mode of time. It is usually translated "In the beginning", but the particle 'the' is not part of the Hebrew text; the person who vocalized the word saw fit to give it an indefinite sense of time and not the sense of the all-embracing transcendental occurence: Be'Reshit, not Ba'Reshit,. Assuming that the voweller was conscious of what he was doing, and this is the approach stressed again and again in this paper, one cannot apply a cosmic interpretation to a text which avoids the cosmic. Therefore when the text states "בְּ·רֵאשִׁ֖ית בָּרָ֣א אֱלֹהִ֑ים", it means to say only what is written: "in a beginning God created . . ." The problems of whether there were other beginnings or when was THE beginning (a question scientifically yet unsolved) are irrelevant for the story, and the practical text, by the very words used, seems to avoid unsolvable problems by relating only to an undefined time and a beginning that concern it. (Chapter II, p. 39)

I more or less agree with him. Grammatically, I came to the same conclusion but supposedly this is an unsound argument via Mike. Fair enough. Biblical Hebrew studies is confusing because it is history, and I am no expert. But even if his grammatical argument is supposedly unsound Gilboa's reasoning when taken in context to the referents (that which the word refers to) of 'the Heaven and the Earth' are sound. The object Heaven and the object Earth (object: that which has shape) were not created simultaneously ex nihilo at THE absolute beginning of created objects. God's Sphere was created first and then the astronomical object Earth was created perhaps billions of years later. That is my belief. Thus the sacred author relates the creation of these two objects in an indefinite beginning. He was a seer. He did not know when these two objects were created in relation to each other. All he knew is that God created the Heaven and the Earth prior to the events that he relates in the narrative. He relates them to God and states them since they are the relevant objects of his narrative. God acts to transfigure the face of the Earth from His home, Heaven, via the Spirit who is emitted to the astronomical object Earth. The Heaven of God is a relevant object in the dynamic of the events described in the Genesis 1 narrative. God acts to change the face of the Earth: from Heaven.

Later in the same chapter Gilboa states:

The author, as discussed beforehand concerning A beginning, avoid the problem of THE beginning and states the existence of A God-creator. The powers of this God are directed toward a very specific creation. . . (p. 44)

The specific created object is the Heaven of God and the astronomical object Earth. I think the Earth is a star that naturally transitioned from an active fusion and compression phase to an inactive dark phase (a planet) for billions of years prior to the main event of Genesis. This beginning stated in Genesis 1:1 is indefinite, obscure, uncertain, unclear, etc. The seer who communicated Genesis 1 had little idea of all the things God did prior to "and the Earth was an astonishing-desert . . . "Let light happen!"

I am going to God with the translation:

In a beginning, God had created the form of Heaven and the form of Earth
And when Earth was an astonishing-desert, etc.    

The Magical Mythical Theory of Relativity

Linked below is the coolest presentation you will ever see that debunks Relativity, Special Relativity, the Big-Bang and Black Holes.  Made by one of my friends. 

The Magical Mythical Theory of Relativity

Enjoy!!!

The Hebrew Shamayim

Some translate the first verse of the Bible

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

The key word here is 'heavens'.  The heavens is a plural translation. The justification for this seems to stem from grammatical studies that the Hebrew word transliterated 'shamayim' (non-phonetic smym) is a Hebrew dual word. There is no singular variant of the Hebrew shamayim. So I looked into this and came to my own conclusion that the Hebrew word 'shamayim' appears as a dual because it is a compound of the Hebrew word 'mayim' meaning waters.

Hebrew, like most other languages, has two characteristic numbers: singular and plural. A third is called the dual which is a modification of the plural preserved by aid of punctuation. The only purpose of this post is to present my opinion that the Hebrew shamayim appears to be a dual since it has the Hebrew dual mayim built into it. If I can rest on this assumption then the referent of shamayim is not always many objects or a pair of objects and from a strict grammatical viewpoint need not be always be translated as a plural.

Some Hebrew words are plural only or dual only. Plural or dual only are words that have no singular variant. An English example is 'glasses' or 'scissors'. The Hebrew word for water: mayim is supposedly a dual only. For whatever reason the ancients conceived, uttered and traced the word referencing water as a pair. Perhaps the reason is they understood the basic systematic relation between the water of the land and the water of the sky.

It seems that this Hebrew word mayim is built into the Hebrew word for heaven: shamayim. Shamayim could be a compound of 'waters' and a prefix. Lets take a look at a couple of sources.

1. The great Medieval Jewish interpreter Rashi.

Rashi's loose translation of Genesis 1:8:

God called the expanse "heaven" because it was made from fire and water. There was evening and there was morning, a second day.

And Rashi's notes:

And God called the expanse heaven: Heb. שָׁמַיִם [This is a combination of the words מַיִם שָׂא, bear water (Gen. Rabbah 4:7); שָׁם מַיִם, there is water; אֵשׁ וּמַיִם, fire and water. He mingled them with one another and made the heavens from them (Chag. 12a).

So with Rashi there is this concept that the Hebrew word shamayim is a word combination: fire in waters, or fire and waters or fiery waters.

2. Scholars Bauer and Leander in Historische Grammatik der hebraischen Sprache des Alten Testaments I return to Proto-semitic postulating the reconstruction of samayim from *sa, which is according to them is the (demonstrative and) relative pronoun, and *maiu “water.” *sa-maii would yield the meaning “place of water.”

3. Min Suc Kee in a little article from the Jewish Bible Quarterly states:

The word shamayim (sky, heaven), which is closely associated with water in the cosmologies and takes the same intriguing dual ending, could be explained in the same manner. A point of interest here is that fact that the words denoting "sky' in the Semitic languages are all spelled by prefixing s/sh to the words meaning "water" in general. Simply understood, for example, shamayim in Hebrew or Aramaic and šamu in Akkadian could be seen as a term combining "of/one of which"(ša) and "waters" (mayim/mu). One might therefore assume that the sky was "one of the waters/of the waters.(see http://jbq.jewishbible.org/assets/Uploads/403/jbq_403_mayim.pdf)

4. Fabre d'Olivet's etymology:

"I am taking up here, the etymology of the word [shamayim] heavens, because it is attached to the one I have been explaining in this article, and because it signifies literally, the waters, raised, brilliant and glorified; being formed from the word [mayim], waters, and from the root which is united to it. This root contains the idea of that which rises and shines in space, that which is distinguished and noticeable by its elevation or its splendour." (From The Hebrew Tongue Restored)

So I conclude the Hebrew word shamayim is a dual since it has the Hebrew dual mayim built into it. Thus shamayim can reference a single object or many objects pending the context. For example in the second day sequence of Genesis One God names a singular object, thus the name should be translated in the singular Heaven not the plural Heavens. If He made a single thing that is Earth's spherical expanse then it follows that the name should be translated singular for this context. If God or a sacred author reference the many stars and galaxies seen through the night sky then the word could be translated in the plural: heavens.

In the Bible shamayim seems to reference either God's sphere, the Earth's sphere, or the stellar spheres seen through the night sky. So all the translator need do is decide what the word references in a particular context and mark singular or plural for his readers. It all boils down to context. Context, context, context. There is no justification for translating oblivious to context or making a case that the shamayim of Genesis 1 or Gen 1:8 should be translated as a plural based on morphology alone.

I am not an expert in Hebrew but this is what my study and pondering leads me to believe. Maybe this is a little folk etymology but I could care less. I do not need to pay out tens of thousands of dollars in order to attempt to translate and interpret Genesis 1, 2, 3.  

I am of the opinion that the shamayim of the first verse of the Bible refers to God's Sphere, the Heaven of God, the Heaven of the Blessed, the Place where God lives. Thus it should be translated in the singular. There is only one Heaven of God. This is the object from where God triggers the main light event described in the subsequent verses. The name Heaven of the second day sequence refers to Earth's atmosphere thus it should also be translated in the singular.

God named Earth's lofty sphere Heaven in order to plant in our brains a connection between His lofty Sphere and Earth's Sphere.