Hi folks,
I have been very surprised to read about the controversies surrounding Joshua’s long day and the various explanations put forward to explain how God could stop the sun and moon. It is plain that stopping or slowing the Earth’s spin would create havoc, as the inertia of the oceans and atmosphere would rip the landscape to shreds: A thing there is no archeological or historical evidence to support.
So various other ideas, ranging from the text being poetical, to confusion with an eclipse, a miracle of refraction, the sun ceasing to shine rather than ceasing to move, even that the verses were a quote from the book of Jasher and not real scripture, have all been tendered. Really, you have to admire the ingenuity!
Even NASA have made a contribution, suggesting that the effects described In Joshua 10 could be achieved by moving the sun itself, but add, in the condescending manner we have come to expect, that there is no evidence of such a thing! NASA, to be fair, only weighed in on the issue, because some desperate soul peddled a rumour to the effect that NASA had uncovered a missing day when their computers were plotting the location of the planets in the distant past. This is one of the famous ‘urban myths’.
As soon as one admits that there is a God, things like stopping the sun and moon are all in a day’s work. But if you take such a view you miss many lessons!
The miracles of God are always instructive, not gratuitous. The miracles have to be understood in terms of a revelation of the kingdom of God. In other words, when the kingdom comes; that is the presence of God is localised, the situation changes. The sick are healed, because in the kingdom of God no one is sick. The blind see and lepers are cleansed for the same reason. There is abundance, not poverty, so a multiplicity of loaves and fish. The fig tree was cursed because it was not fruitful. Jesus’ tetchy attitude towards a tree shows that he does not compromise with a fallen world. Demons flee and the dead are raised because these are the normal rules of heaven. You don’t get God making fire breathing dragons or flying horses! The miracles are simply a tweak of the existing laws of nature.
Walking on water and the ascension could be seen as a violation of natural law, but both events were, in my opinion, performed for illustrative purposes and applying a force under Jesus is not breaking a physical law.
So where does this leave us with Joshua’s long day?
God could very easily stop the sun and moon by slowing time. Slowing time in the sense that time passes normally on the earth, but outside the earth, time was passing much quicker, at the normal rate in fact. For the scientists among you, this is exactly what happens in relativity. If we are in a spaceship travelling very fast or in a ship that approaches a super massive object, time slows down. This doesn’t mean we all start moving in slo-mo. The result would be exactly what was described in Joshua. The time would pass normally on earth, so Joshua’s army could continue fighting. But the sun and moon, being outside the frame of slowed or stopped time, would appear from the earth, not to move.
Certainly a miracle was involved, namely slowing time, but this is not a violation of nature. Time can slow down as part of natural physics.
I am curious to know why this view about time is never offered as an explanation for Joshua’s long day, when obviously phoney explanations, like an eclipse are? Perhaps lots of people have suggested slowing time and I just haven’t found them?
I have been very surprised to read about the controversies surrounding Joshua’s long day and the various explanations put forward to explain how God could stop the sun and moon. It is plain that stopping or slowing the Earth’s spin would create havoc, as the inertia of the oceans and atmosphere would rip the landscape to shreds: A thing there is no archeological or historical evidence to support.
So various other ideas, ranging from the text being poetical, to confusion with an eclipse, a miracle of refraction, the sun ceasing to shine rather than ceasing to move, even that the verses were a quote from the book of Jasher and not real scripture, have all been tendered. Really, you have to admire the ingenuity!
Even NASA have made a contribution, suggesting that the effects described In Joshua 10 could be achieved by moving the sun itself, but add, in the condescending manner we have come to expect, that there is no evidence of such a thing! NASA, to be fair, only weighed in on the issue, because some desperate soul peddled a rumour to the effect that NASA had uncovered a missing day when their computers were plotting the location of the planets in the distant past. This is one of the famous ‘urban myths’.
As soon as one admits that there is a God, things like stopping the sun and moon are all in a day’s work. But if you take such a view you miss many lessons!
The miracles of God are always instructive, not gratuitous. The miracles have to be understood in terms of a revelation of the kingdom of God. In other words, when the kingdom comes; that is the presence of God is localised, the situation changes. The sick are healed, because in the kingdom of God no one is sick. The blind see and lepers are cleansed for the same reason. There is abundance, not poverty, so a multiplicity of loaves and fish. The fig tree was cursed because it was not fruitful. Jesus’ tetchy attitude towards a tree shows that he does not compromise with a fallen world. Demons flee and the dead are raised because these are the normal rules of heaven. You don’t get God making fire breathing dragons or flying horses! The miracles are simply a tweak of the existing laws of nature.
Walking on water and the ascension could be seen as a violation of natural law, but both events were, in my opinion, performed for illustrative purposes and applying a force under Jesus is not breaking a physical law.
So where does this leave us with Joshua’s long day?
God could very easily stop the sun and moon by slowing time. Slowing time in the sense that time passes normally on the earth, but outside the earth, time was passing much quicker, at the normal rate in fact. For the scientists among you, this is exactly what happens in relativity. If we are in a spaceship travelling very fast or in a ship that approaches a super massive object, time slows down. This doesn’t mean we all start moving in slo-mo. The result would be exactly what was described in Joshua. The time would pass normally on earth, so Joshua’s army could continue fighting. But the sun and moon, being outside the frame of slowed or stopped time, would appear from the earth, not to move.
Certainly a miracle was involved, namely slowing time, but this is not a violation of nature. Time can slow down as part of natural physics.
I am curious to know why this view about time is never offered as an explanation for Joshua’s long day, when obviously phoney explanations, like an eclipse are? Perhaps lots of people have suggested slowing time and I just haven’t found them?
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