Revelation 7:1

Does the Bible teach that the world is square?

PROBLEM: John speaks here of the “four corners of the earth,” which implies that the earth is square. But modern science teaches that it is round. Isn’t this a mistake in the Bible?

SOLUTION: The Bible does not teach that the world is square. First of all, this is a figure of speech meaning “from every section of the globe” or as Jeremiah put it, “from the four quarters of heaven” (Jeremiah 49:36). It is a succinct way of referring to the four directions, “north, south, east, and west.” In this sense it is akin to the phrase, “the four winds … of heaven” (Jeremiah 49:36).

The only references to the shape of the earth in the Bible speak of it as round. Isaiah spoke of God “who sits on the circle of the earth … (Isaiah 40:22, MKJV). And Job refers to the world as hanging in space, asserted that God “stretches out the north over the empty place, [and] He hung the earth on nothing” (Job 26:7, MKJV). There is certainly nothing unscientific about these statements.