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YUSUFALI: And the earth We have spread out (like a carpet);
set thereon mountains firm and immovable; and produced therein
all kinds of things in due balance.
PICKTHAL: And the earth have We spread out, and placed
therein firm hills, and caused each seemly thing to grow
therein.
SHAKIR: And the earth-- We have spread it forth and made in
it firm mountains and caused to grow in it of every suitable
thing.
Go outside, into the country away from the city lights. Find a
place, like a hill, where you can look around and see the
horizon. What do you see? Do you see the earth spread out? Do
you see that it looks circular or disk shaped? Look over head.
What do you see? Do you see a vast expanse of sky forming a
dome over your head? Stay there for a day and watch the
sunrise in the east. Then watch the sun travel on its way
across the sky and set in the west. Stay there for the night
and, if you have a clear sky, look at the stars. If you do
this for a number of night you will notice that most stars
stay fixed relative to each other but there are five stars
that can be seen with the naked eye that wonder across the
sky. These five stars are the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars,
Jupiter and Saturn (together with the sun and moon we get the
seven days of the week). The word "planet" means
"wondered".
These observations of the heavens were made by the ancients
thousands of years ago and, from these observations, they
tried to reason about the world they found them selves in.
They believed that the earth was a flat disk spread out
because it looked like that to them. They observed the motions
of the sun, moon and the planets and reason that each followed
its own orbit. The ancient Greeks likened these orbits to a
chariot wheel. They believed that the earth was fixed because
that is how it appeared to them. The sun, moon and the
planets, therefore, orbited the earth. They had there own
explanations for the coming of night. The Greeks also reasoned
that there were many worlds.
As time progressed the Greeks developed other ideas about
the earth. They worked out that the earth was a sphere and
they developed models of the solar system that had the earth
orbiting other objects (such as the sun or a central fire).
However, the idea of a flat earth was still dominant in the
minds of many of the ordinary people in the ancient world
because it fitted their observations.
What do we see if we look at the cosmology in the Koran?
The Koran makes the same observations of the heavens and the
earth; the earth is observed as being spread out like a carpet
or a bed (15:19, 20:53, 43:10, 71:19). The Koran describes the
rising and setting of the sun (36:38, 2.258) and it even has a
place for the sun to set and to rise (18.86, 18.90). It
describes the sun in orbit (13.2, 21.33), obeying the commands
of Allah, with the sky forming a canopy (21.32, 2.22) over a
fixed earth (27.61, 31.10). It describes the stars fixed on to
this canopy (41.12, 67.5) (except for when they are being
thrown at genies) and it considers that this canopy was once
part of the earth before it was broken away (21.30).
All these observations made in the Koran are the type of
observations that the ancients made long before Islam and are
consistent with a flat earth view. They are the types of
observations that would be expected had the Koran been of
human origin because they reflect the knowledge of the time.
No where in the Koran can we find anything about the earth or
the other planets orbiting the sun, for example, because this
was unknown to the ancients.
Conclusion
The overwhelming view of the earth and the heavens in the
Koran is consistent with the flat earth view. The Koran,
therefore, is clearly in error in it's cosmology.
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