The Firmament
by Michael

A few deep thoughts on your message today came to mind and I wanted to share…

But before someone nitpicks Gen 1:1 and how it is translated as “Heaven” (singular) vs. heavens (pl), let me preempt the dispute for you and save some trouble ;-) You know it’s the same word. It’s H8064 shamayim. There’s only one word for heaven/heavens. The KJV translates the word in the singular or the plural depending on the context or perhaps the whim of the translators. Sometimes just to make more sense out of a passage, like the many times the phrase is used, “the heaven of the heavens”—literally, ‘the shamayim of shamayim’…

“Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD'S thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is.”

Technically the word shamayim renders as a plural as it’s taken from an “unused root from the singular, shameh”—according to Strong. So “God created the heavens and the earth” is not wrong per se.

Personally, I wish they’d have left the word untranslated. “In the beginning, God created the shamayim and the earth” (since no one knows what a 'firmament' is anyways). It would have left the mystery and the beauty of it intact, for surely that first passage in the Bible is the most profound and alluring—and succinct of all statements. But in Gen 1:1, something very particular is being described I think, not some nebulous “Heaven”, and is why it’s translated here in the singular. Here’s why—getting down to vs. 8, (and some miss this) we have,

“And God called the firmament Heaven...”

Now we already know the firmament (raqiya) is what separates the waters from the waters, and it is a hard or solid thing—above the earth. This is the “vault of heaven”. So replace the word in vs. 1, and I think what is being conveyed is simply this: “In the beginning, God created the Firmament and the Earth.”

He made two things out of a substance (which came from Him obviously as all substance ‘proceedeth out from Him’) where before there was nothing. He made the earth, laying its foundations “on nothing” (Job 26:7) and the waters covered it. And He then made the Firmament (not the “heavens”) over the earth and to separate two bodies of water—one above and one below (the Deep). So, it should be singular here in Gen 1:1, as the KJV has it.

The “heavens” are both the space beneath the firmament and above the earth (which we’d call the “sky”), and another space which may include the waters above the firmament -- and also possibly describing a space above that (the “heaven of the heavens” which is the abode of Yahweh and His throne). I think that is what Ezekiel saw, and also is what Paul describes when he says he was “caught up into the third heaven”.

So we have the birds of the air created to “fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.” (v.20) That word “open” actually means “in the face of, or in the presence of”. So the place the birds would fly (and the clouds would be) is 'before the countenance of the Firmament'—or actually under it, not in it.

But before that, we have God creating the great lights in the firmament of the heavens. There’s actually no prepositional words there, the text just reads “let lights firmament heaven” . So where exactly were these placed? Within the crystalline vault of the firmament or above it, or rather IN it, as we are without it; below it.

Point is, I guess, we don’t know whether the luminaries—the moon, the sun, the stars—are even physical objects, or where exactly they are. They may be electrical manifestations on the vault itself, or in waters above it.

There’s another word, H7834, shachaq. Translated “cloud, sky, heaven”. Mostly cloud. It’s from a root meaning ‘dust or fine powder’. Since it basically means clouds or skies, it’s euphemistically or metaphorically used for “heaven” also. And at least once, it’s used to represent the Firmament itself.

Job 37:18 “Hast thou with him spread out the sky, which is strong, and as a molten looking glass?”

That word “spread out” is raqa, ‘to beat out, stamp, or stretch, as in a metal plating or overlay’ (as in Exodus 39:3). Here, "sky" is shachaq. And the word “looking glass” is re'iy, ‘a molten cast mirror’. Mirrors were cast from molten brass and then highly polished (Ex 38:8)
This is the Firmament. What it’s made of, God knows. But I believe it is both transparent AND reflective, as a tinted glass is. It both transmits light above it and it ‘scatters’ light below it.

I saw the total solar eclipse in 2017 in northern Georgia. I watched it with my own eyes through a good monocular scope (no need to ‘shield the UV’ during totality—the ridiculous eclipse glasses were useless anyway). What I saw was not what NASA shows us as pictures of the sun. There were not tongues of fire licking out of it. There was only a very faint plasma, like a luminous vapor…The thin corona was absolutely electrical in nature, not at all gaseous or flame. And the ‘sun’ itself was an absolute black hole in the sky…the most perfect circle, the most blackest of black. There was nothing there at all. I think that was the most transcendental experience of my life, and I believe I saw something of God’s creation that I had never perceived before—and very few have ever. I don’t know really what it was, but it was beautiful beyond description and it was EXACTLY what Yahweh said He made in His own words… and man just won’t accept it. So He gave them a lie to believe in. An inferior reality—an empty and a hopeless universe, born of an "explosion" and dying an entropic "heat death".

The truth is so many magnitudes more lovely and surprising! Truly David said,

“The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.”

If you have any doubters or naysayers to your message today, Charlie, feel free to forward this message on.