AiG

EDWARD T. BABINSKI SAID:

“Do you honestly believe that one Young Earth creationist ancient historian, Noel Weeks, who writes for ‘Answers in Genesis’ is on par with the scholars I mentioned in my blog reply (and in my chapter) whose specialties are ANE cosmologies?”

I could easily turn that question around. Is a guy who contributes to The Christian Delusion on par with a man of his credentials?

You cite AiG as a guilt-by-association tactic. But AiG is a mixed bag. Ken Ham is no expert. But then, Ken Ham operates at the same level as Ed Babinski or Paul Tobin.

On the other hand, some contributors to AiG have impressive credentials.

“The three-tier view was held for thousands of years in both Egypt and Mesopotamia. It's visible in ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian writings and the Bible, and visible in creation myths, creation-related passages, and implied in other passages that do not directly discuss cosmology.”

There’s nothing mythological about the triple-decker imagery in Scripture. Rather, it simply involves the banal observation that the atmosphere is higher than the dry land, while the dry land is higher than the submarine domain:

Deut 4:17-18:

...or like any animal on earth or any bird that flies in the air, or like any creature that moves along the ground or any fish in the waters below.