Make Whatever You Want of This

Modern science understands that outer space is not simply an empty void.  Apparently, so does the Bible because, in numerous places, it speaks of God stretching out the heavens. This does not mean that the ancients understood any modern concepts of space and physics. Many of the ancient philosophers believed that reality included both seen and unseen components. The Bible itself never uses the word dimensions.

The heavens can be torn. Isaiah 64:1

The heavens can be worn like a garment. Psalm 102

The heavens can be split apart. Revelation 6:14

The heavens can be burned. 2 Peter 3:12

The heavens can be rolled up, bent, and curved. Hebrews 1:12.

The Christian writer, Chuck Missler (1934-2018) believed that the Hebrews citation implied the reality of dimensions extra to ours. Some apologists say that to roll up the heavens implies that the one doing the rolling must be outside of what is being rolled.

Missler cited the proto-kabbalist rabbi Saadia Gaon (892-942) who, in his Sefer Yetzirah (The Book of Creation) stated that there are a total of ten dimensions with four being directly observable. Interestingly, modern physics defines at least ten dimensions, four of which are measurable.

Kabbalism is a form of Jewish mysticism and the ten dimensions discussed by Gaon are considered to be attributes of God through which he interacts with the world in which we live. The teachings of kabbalah are highly esoteric with secret names, angels, demons, hidden doctrines, God as unknowable and unlimited, panentheism (God is all that really exists), acceptance by some of the doctrine of reincarnation, every individual letter of the Torah carries a hidden spiritual meaning and power, God created the universe by moving the Hebrew letters around, the Torah contains hidden messages and each letter represents a number, combinations of the numbers are also studied. To many critics, Christian and Jewish, this philosophy appears to have fallen into extreme eisegesis, reading doctrine into the Bible.

Make whatever you want of this. Most modern theologians, especially conservative High-Bible theologians, explicitly reject eisegesis and think that it is unwarranted to expect the Bible to be a quantum physics textbook.

2 Kings 6:16-17; 2 Corinthians 12:2-4; Luke 24:31; John 20:19; Acts 1:9.