[Avodah] flat earth

[Eli Turkel]

I do not understand how. Even I was able to dig up evidence that the
Ptolmeic model was accepted by Chazal in Rebbe's day. The only evidence I
found for a flat earth were R' Eliezer and R' Yehoshua, two generations
before, and R Chiya, a talmid of Rebbe's (who still believed in orbits,
just around a flat earth). >>

I lost the connection between Ptoelmy (sun circling earth) and a flat earth.

Some of the gemaras that show that most of chazal understood a flat earth are:
Rava and R. Natan on Pesachim 94a
Ben Zoma on Chagigah 15a
Rabbah Bar Huna ob Baba Batra 74a (the story itself is obviously not real)
Yoma 20b

In all these cases see Rashi

Pirkei deRebbi Eleazar ch. 3:
R. Eliezer states the beams that hold up the sky are fixed in the
waters of the Ocean Sea.
The waters of the ocean sea stretch from the end of the land to the
edge of the sky.
The ends of the sky over the waters of the Ocean Sea are spread out.

All these sources picture a flat (or perhaps circular) earth with the
sky as a dome
on top reaching (or almost reaching) the earth at th ends of the arch.

Of course there is the famous machloket of Rebbe and the Chachamim whether
the goyim were right or not (both were wrong!)

R. Eliezer and R. Yehoshua in Chagigah 12b (see also tosfos)
see also Sanhedrin 38b on the size of Adam

-- 
Eli Turkel