Building on both Christian scriptures and Aristotelian notions of the four elements, many patristic, medieval, and sixteenth-century Christians held that water could and perhaps should cover the whole earth. Christian and Jewish exegetes from Basil the Great and into the sixteenth century discussed the dry land’s existence in their commentaries on Genesis 1.9–10, arguing that its existence was either natural, preternatural, or a supernatural act of God. Analyzing patristic, medieval and sixteenth-century exegeses of these biblical verses, this article explores how these Christian and Jewish exegetes categorized water’s failure to flood the earth. It argues that the possibilities for characterizing water’s behavior expanded greatly in the sixteenth century. Whereas patristic and medieval authors tended to claim that the natural order God had established during the process of creation could account for water’s failure to submerge the earth, sixteenth-century exegetes offered a wide variety of categorizations, arguing that water’s behavior was natural, preternatural, supernatural, a wonder, or even a miracle. Drawing on contemporary scholarship on sixteenth-century cosmographical models, this paper argues that fifteenth- and sixteenth-century sea voyages and encounters with people living in the Southern Hemisphere might have led these sixteenth-century exegetes to reexamine the categories as they did.

中文翻译：

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“让众水聚在一起，让旱地显现”：上下文中的创世记 1.9-10 的十六世纪注释

建立在基督教经文和亚里士多德的四种元素概念的基础上，许多教父、中世纪和 16 世纪的基督徒都认为水可以而且或许应该覆盖整个地球。从巴西尔大帝到 16 世纪，基督教和犹太教的解经家在他们对创世记 1.9-10 的评论中讨论了旱地的存在，认为它的存在要么是自然的，要么是超自然的，要么是上帝的超自然行为。本文分析了这些圣经经文的教父、中世纪和 16 世纪的解经，探讨了这些基督教和犹太解经如何对水未能淹没地球进行分类。它认为表征水行为的可能性在 16 世纪大大扩展。教父和中世纪的作者倾向于声称上帝在创造过程中建立的自然秩序可以解释水未能淹没地球的原因，而 16 世纪的解经提供了各种各样的分类，认为水的行为是自然的、超自然的，超自然，奇迹，甚至奇迹。借鉴当代关于 16 世纪宇宙学模型的学术研究，本文认为 15 和 16 世纪的海上​​航行以及与生活在南半球的人们的相遇可能导致这些 16 世纪的解经者像他们一样重新审视这些类别。超自然，超自然，奇迹，甚至奇迹。借鉴当代关于 16 世纪宇宙学模型的学术研究，本文认为 15 和 16 世纪的海上​​航行以及与生活在南半球的人们的相遇可能导致这些 16 世纪的解经者像他们一样重新审视这些类别。超自然，超自然，奇迹，甚至奇迹。借鉴当代关于 16 世纪宇宙学模型的学术研究，本文认为 15 和 16 世纪的海上​​航行以及与生活在南半球的人们的相遇可能导致这些 16 世纪的解经者像他们一样重新审视这些类别。