Search Tools


 
Which alone spreadeth out the heavens, and treadeth upon the waves of the sea.

New Defender's Study Bible Notes

9:8 spreadeth out the heavens. This is the first of at least eleven references in the Bible to God “spreading” or “stretching” out the heavens. All of these make it plain that this was the direct result of the word of God, not the result of a primeval explosion of an infinitesimal universe, as the Big Bang theorists believe. These passages may suggest the expanding universe or, more likely, simply the infinite extension of space.


9:9 maketh Arcturus. God not only created and named the stars (e.g., Isaiah 40:26), but also the constellations (also see Job 38:31-33). This fact surely relates to the fact that God created the stars as “signs” (not in the astrological sense but in the evangelical sense), as repositories in the skies of God’s primeval promises of the coming Savior and restoration of the fallen creation.


9:9 chambers of the south. The word usually suggests a distinct room, so probably here refers to the many majestic constellations in the southern sky, opposite to the region containing the bright constellation Orion and the nearby Pleiades (see also Job 38:31). Near the latter is also the group of stars known as the Great Bear, or sometimes as the Ploughman. This group is actually what is meant by Arcturus.


About the New Defender's Study Bible