The Inquisition's sentence against Galileo's heliocentrism as contrary to Scripture poses a fundamental question. Was the claim factual that the Church's traditional interpretation of Scripture opposed heliocentrism? This article researches the unexamined evidence from hundreds of authoritative citations of Psalm 19:5-6, the alleged proof text against heliocentrism. It documents that the exegetical and liturgical traditions consistently interpreted those verses as allegorical about Jesus not literal about the sun. The doctrine at issue was the Incarnation. Opposition to heliocentrism was an idiosyncrasy, prominently of Roberto Bellarmino, who claimed a universal literal exegesis of Psalm 19:5-6 as solar movement. Galileo countered with his own literal exegesis. Neither literalism was Church tradition, which was neither geocentric nor heliocentric but Christocentric. Moreover, the Hebrew of Psalm 19:5-6 was merism, a Semitic figure for totality by polarized opposites. The Inquisition's sentence repeated Bellarmino's from east to west, although heliocentrism was not traditionally contrary to Scripture.
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