Science and the Bible - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

See Scientific foreknowledge in sacred texts for alleged biblical anticipation of modern scientific discoveries.

Some of the various books of the Hebrew Bible

Hebrew Bible

The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...

contain descriptions of the physical world

Physical science

Physical science is an encompassing term for the branches of natural science and science that study non-living systems, in contrast to the life sciences...

. These descriptions can be part of developing a history of science

History of science in early cultures

The history of science in early cultures refers to the study of protoscience in ancient history, prior to the development of science in the Middle Ages. In prehistoric times, advice and knowledge was passed from generation to generation in an oral tradition. The development of writing enabled...

during Levant

Levant

The Levant or ) is the geographic region and culture zone of the "eastern Mediterranean littoral between Anatolia and Egypt" . The Levant includes most of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian territories, and sometimes parts of Turkey and Iraq, and corresponds roughly to the...

's Iron Age

Iron Age

The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...

.

The school of thought known as Panbabylonianism took the Hebrew Bible as entirely derived from the culture and mythology of Babylonia

Babylonia

Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia , with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as a major power when Hammurabi Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as...

as it stood during the 6th century BCE, during the Babylonian captivity

Babylonian captivity

The Babylonian captivity was the period in Jewish history during which the Jews of the ancient Kingdom of Judah were captives in Babylon—conventionally 587–538 BCE....

. Current mainstream does allow for the possibility that some elements, particularly of the Torah

Torah

Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...

, are independent of Babylonian influence, dating perhaps as early as the 9th or 10th century BCE, but the significant influence of Babylonian mythology and Babylonian cosmology on the worldview presented in the Tanakh is still beyond doubt.

The Christian New Testament

New Testament

The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

is a product of the Roman era and reflects the worldview of that epoch in some instances, e.g. in references to astrology

Astrology

Astrology consists of a number of belief systems which hold that there is a relationship between astronomical phenomena and events in the human world...

or demonic possession

Demonic possession

Demonic possession is held by many belief systems to be the control of an individual by a malevolent supernatural being. Descriptions of demonic possessions often include erased memories or personalities, convulsions, “fits” and fainting as if one were dying...

Cosmology and astronomy

Biblical cosmology

The various authors of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament provide glimpses of their views regarding cosmology.According to the Genesis creation narrative, the cosmos created by Elohim has three levels, with the habitable world in the centre, an underworld below and the heavens above...

provides sporadic glimpses that may be stitched together to form a Biblical impression of the physical universe. There have been comparisons between the Bible, with passages such as from the Genesis creation narrative, and the astronomy of classical antiquity more generally.

The worldview of the Tanakh, some have argued, is clearly that of a flat earth

Flat Earth

The Flat Earth model is a belief that the Earth's shape is a plane or disk. Most ancient cultures have had conceptions of a flat Earth, including Greece until the classical period, the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period, India until the Gupta period ...

(e.g.) in a geocentric universe (e.g. , ), along with Mesopotamian astronomy of the period . While Christians argue that the term chuwg 'erets (translated as circle of the earth) in refers to a "round earth", critics argue that it meant a "flat earth". They argue that if Isaiah wanted to refer to a spherical earth, he would have used the term kadur (sphere) in Hebrew . After "the circle of the earth" in Isaiah 40:22, the passage says God is "stretching out the heavens" or expanding the universe, which is a view of the universe supported by most astronomers now and seen by Creationist Christians as supporting the biblical text. In addition, they argue Job 26:10 more clearly states that the horizon is circular, which is only always possible for a spherical globe.

The spherical shape of the earth

Spherical Earth

The concept of a spherical Earth dates back to ancient Greek philosophy from around the 6th century BC, but remained a matter of philosophical speculation until the 3rd century BC when Hellenistic astronomy established the spherical shape of the earth as a physical given...

was established with certainty only in Hellenistic astronomy, in the 3rd century BCE. The first suggestions of heliocentrism also date to the Hellenistic period but remained speculative until the 16th century CE. Recent measurements from satellite

Satellite

In the context of spaceflight, a satellite is an object which has been placed into orbit by human endeavour. Such objects are sometimes called artificial satellites to distinguish them from natural satellites such as the Moon....

s show that the Earth is, in fact, an oblate spheroid flattened at the poles.

Lactantius

Lactantius

Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius was an early Christian author who became an advisor to the first Christian Roman emperor, Constantine I, guiding his religious policy as it developed, and tutor to his son.-Biography:...

and Cosmas Indicopleustes

Cosmas Indicopleustes

Cosmas Indicopleustes was an Alexandrian merchant and later hermit, probably of Nestorian tendencies. He was a 6th-century traveller, who made several voyages to India during the reign of emperor Justinian...

insisted on the flat Earth

Flat Earth

model on scriptural authority as late as the 5th to 6th century, long after the spherical shape of the Earth

Spherical Earth

had been deduced in Hellenistic astronomy, and had been generally accepted by their fellow Christians.

In the reception of Heliocentrism

Heliocentrism

Heliocentrism, or heliocentricism, is the astronomical model in which the Earth and planets revolve around a stationary Sun at the center of the universe. The word comes from the Greek . Historically, heliocentrism was opposed to geocentrism, which placed the Earth at the center...

after Copernicus, biblical references 1 Chronicles 16:30, Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, Psalm 104:5, and Ecclesiastes 1:5 were cited for biblical support of geocentrism. Chronicles 16:30 states that "the world also shall be stable, that it be not moved." Psalm 104:5 says, "[the Lord] Who laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be removed for ever." Ecclesiastes 1:5 states that "The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose." Galileo defended heliocentrism

Heliocentrism

, and claimed it was not contrary to those Scripture passages. He took Augustine

Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo , also known as Augustine, St. Augustine, St. Austin, St. Augoustinos, Blessed Augustine, or St. Augustine the Blessed, was Bishop of Hippo Regius . He was a Latin-speaking philosopher and theologian who lived in the Roman Africa Province...

's position on Scripture. The most supportive bible passage of their view was Job 26:7, where Job declares that God "hangs the earth on nothing", which for its time was very close to how modern astronomers would describe the Earth's position.

There are passages that denote the moon as being luminous

Luminosity

Luminosity is a measurement of brightness.-In photometry and color imaging:In photometry, luminosity is sometimes incorrectly used to refer to luminance, which is the density of luminous intensity in a given direction. The SI unit for luminance is candela per square metre.The luminosity function...

.(Gen 1:16) Some argue that, as in Babylonian cosmography, the Hebrew Bible imagines Earth covered by a solid sky-dome (the Firmament

Firmament

The firmament is the vault or expanse of the sky. According to Genesis, God created the firmament to separate the oceans from other waters above.-Etymology:...

) to which the stars were attached. Nevertheless, others have argued this was before the fall of man (Genesis 3) and flood of Noah's time (Genesis 6), thus the atmosphere may have changed significantly since that time. Still others suggest that the firmament was actually beneath the earth.

Augustus Hopkins Strong

Augustus Hopkins Strong

Augustus Hopkins Strong was a Baptist minister and theologian who lived in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries...

presented another explanation of all the alleged inaccuracies reflected in the Hebrew Bible in his work, Systematic Theology: The Doctrine of God. Strong pointed out idiomatic usage of moonlight and sunset are still prevalent in current times as in ancient times, and that the word firmament has been used in literature where no one would suggest the author believed in flat earth or solid firmament theology. He illustrated the point by asking if Dickens believed the firmament was "a piece of solid masonry" when "in his American Notes, 72, [Dickens] describes a prairie sunset: 'The decline of day here was very gorgeous, tinging the firmament deeply with red and gold, up to the very keystone of the arch above us'." However, it is possible that Dickens was writing this passage with a conscious or unconscious reliance on the biblical motif itself. Many scholars (other than those ascribing to some form of Biblical inerrancy

Biblical inerrancy

Biblical inerrancy is the doctrinal position that the Bible is accurate and totally free of error, that "Scripture in the original manuscripts does not affirm anything that is contrary to fact." Some equate inerrancy with infallibility; others do not.Conservative Christians generally believe that...

doctrine) generally accept that such metaphors in the Bible reflect the authors' underlying belief in the literal truth of this cosmological model.

Medicine

The Deuteronomic Code

Deuteronomic Code

The Deuteronomic Code is the name given by academics to the law code within the Book of Deuteronomy. It contains "a variety of topics including religious ceremonies and ritual purity, civil and criminal law, and the conduct of war"...

contains several sanitation instructions; in particular, contains instructions to dispose of human waste

Feces

Feces, faeces, or fæces is a waste product from an animal's digestive tract expelled through the anus or cloaca during defecation.-Etymology:...

away from the population, in order to keep locations holy.

The Old Testament contains a variety of health related instructions, such as isolating infected people , washing after handling a dead body , and burying excrement away from a camp .

The Old Testament also contains various healing rituals. One ritual, for example, deals with the proper procedure for cleansing a leper . It is a fairly elaborate process involving extensive cleansing and personal hygiene, but also includes killing a bird and lambs with the addition of using their blood to cleanse the afflicted.

There is a contention that the degree of effectiveness of the Mosaic dietary restrictions and hygienic strictures indicates and, on the extreme end, "it has taken science thousands of years to discover what the Bible taught all along". Though civilizations that had large cities had public sanitation systems

Public health

Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" . It is concerned with threats to health based on population health...

, such as Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...

, the Aegean civilization

Aegean civilization

Aegean civilization is a general term for the Bronze Age civilizations of Greece around the Aegean Sea. There are three distinct but communicating and interacting geographic regions covered by this term: Crete, the Cyclades and the Greek mainland. Crete is associated with the Minoan civilization...

, the Hittites

Hittites

The Hittites were a Bronze Age people of Anatolia.They established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia c. the 18th century BC. The Hittite empire reached its height c...

, and the Elamites.

Passages within the Book of Proverbs

Book of Proverbs

The Book of Proverbs , commonly referred to simply as Proverbs, is a book of the Hebrew Bible.The original Hebrew title of the book of Proverbs is "Míshlê Shlomoh" . When translated into Greek and Latin, the title took on different forms. In the Greek Septuagint the title became "paroimai paroimiae"...

relate the two, such as , , , , . Modern science has found that certain proverbs contain advice toward sound mental and physical well-being.

Agriculture and ecology

The Jewish religious laws proscribe intercropping

Intercropping

Intercropping is the practice of growing two or more crops in proximity. The most common goal of intercropping is to produce a greater yield on a given piece of land by making use of resources that would otherwise not be utilized by a single crop. Careful planning is required, taking into account...

(Lev. 19:19, Deut 22:9), a practice often associated with sustainable agriculture and organic farming in modern agricultural science

Agricultural science

Agricultural science is a broad multidisciplinary field that encompasses the parts of exact, natural, economic and social sciences that are used in the practice and understanding of agriculture. -Agriculture and agricultural science:The two terms are often confused...

.

speaks of leaving fields fallow for a year every seven years.

The Mosaic code has provisions concerning the conservation of natural resources, such as trees and birds .

Biology

There have been comparisons between the Bible, with passages such as from the Genesis creation narrative, with concepts based on evolutionary theory.

	Bible (Literal interpretation)		Evolutionary biology
	Genesis 1 account	Genesis 2 account
Grass, land plants, trees	Created before the Sun	Created after the Sun	Evolved after the Sun
First forms of life	Land plants	Human (Adam only)	Prokaryote Prokaryote The prokaryotes are a group of organisms that lack a cell nucleus , or any other membrane-bound organelles. The organisms that have a cell nucleus are called eukaryotes. Most prokaryotes are unicellular, but a few such as myxobacteria have multicellular stages in their life cycles... (bacteria, archaea)
Birds	Created before land animals	Created at the same time with all the beasts of the field	Evolved from land animals
Fruit Trees	Created before fish	fish are not mentioned	Evolved after fish
First Human	not mentioned how Adam and Eve were created	Created from dirt (Adam only) Eve was created from Adam's rib	Evolved; higher apes and Homo sapiens share a common ancestor

A popular creationist argument against the theory of evolution is the lack of numerous transitional fossil

Transitional fossil

A transitional fossil is any fossilized remains of a lifeform that exhibits characteristics of two distinct taxonomic groups. A transitional fossil is the fossil of an organism near the branching point where major individual lineages diverge...

s in the fossil record, supporting the biblical account of creation over the gradual evolution of species. This supposition has been refuted by the scientific community by pointing out the wealth of transition fossils found, as well as various mechanisms of fossilisation and of evolution that explain differences in the numbers of different kinds of fossils found.

Relationship between religion and science

The relationship between religion and science has been a focus of the demarcation problem

Demarcation problem

The demarcation problem in the philosophy of science is about how and where to draw the lines around science. The boundaries are commonly drawn between science and non-science, between science and pseudoscience, between science and philosophy and between science and religion...

, which in philosophy

Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

attempts to draw the line between science and nonscience

Pseudoscience

Pseudoscience is a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status...

. Some scholars, like Thomas Berry

Thomas Berry

Thomas Berry, C.P. was a Catholic priest of the Passionist order, cultural historian and ecotheologian ....

and Brian Swimme

Brian Swimme

Brian Thomas Swimme is on the faculty of the California Institute of Integral Studies, in San Francisco, where he teaches evolutionary cosmology to graduate students in the humanities. He received his Ph.D. from the department of mathematics at the University of Oregon for work in singularity...

, argue that the two are interconnected. Others like Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould was an American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science. He was also one of the most influential and widely read writers of popular science of his generation....

and the National Academy of Sciences

United States National Academy of Sciences

The National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...

take the view that each occupy a separate nonoverlapping magisterium

Non-overlapping magisteria

Non-overlapping magisteria is the view advocated by Stephen Jay Gould that "science and religion do not glower at each other... [but] interdigitate in patterns of complex fingering, and at every fractal scale of self-similarity." He suggests, with examples, that "NOMA enjoys strong and fully...

.

According to this view, statements about the physical world made by science and religion rely on different methodologies. Science

Science

Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

relies on the scientific method

Scientific method

Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of...

as a body of techniques

Scientific technique

A scientific technique is any systematic way of obtaining information about a scientific nature or to obtain a desired material or product.Scientific techniques can be divided in many different groups, e.g.:# Preparative techniques...

used for investigating natural phenomena. To be termed scientific, a claim must be based on observable, empirical, and measurable evidence

Evidence

Evidence in its broadest sense includes everything that is used to determine or demonstrate the truth of an assertion. Giving or procuring evidence is the process of using those things that are either presumed to be true, or were themselves proven via evidence, to demonstrate an assertion's truth...

, which is subject to systematic principles of reasoning. In contrast, much of Christianity relies on Biblical inspiration

Biblical inspiration

Biblical inspiration is the doctrine in Christian theology that the authors and editors of the Bible were led or influenced by God with the result that their writings many be designated in some sense the word of God.- Etymology :...

, a doctrine in Christian theology

Christian theology

- Divisions of Christian theology :There are many methods of categorizing different approaches to Christian theology. For a historical analysis, see the main article on the History of Christian theology.- Sub-disciplines :...

concerned with the divine origin of the Bible and what the Bible teaches.

Skeptics

Scientific skepticism

Scientific skepticism is the practice of questioning the veracity of claims lacking empirical evidence or reproducibility, as part of a methodological norm pursuing "the extension of certified knowledge". For example, Robert K...

argue that the various biblical statements are at odds with scientific knowledge, particularly with regard to its claims regarding the origin of the cosmos

Big Bang

The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model that explains the early development of the Universe. According to the Big Bang theory, the Universe was once in an extremely hot and dense state which expanded rapidly. This rapid expansion caused the young Universe to cool and resulted in...

, astronomy

Astronomy

Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...

, and biological evolution

Evolution

Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...

. The "Conflict thesis

Conflict thesis

The conflict thesis proposes an intrinsic intellectual conflict between religion and science. The original historical usage of the term denoted that the historical record indicates religion’s perpetual opposition to science. Later uses of the term denote religion’s epistemological opposition to...

" is the argument that religion and science are at constant warfare with one another. This is exemplified by such examples as the persecution

Galileo affair

The Galileo affair was a sequence of events, beginning around 1610, during which Galileo Galilei came into conflict with the Aristotelian scientific view of the universe , over his support of Copernican astronomy....

of Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei , was an Italian physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who played a major role in the Scientific Revolution. His achievements include improvements to the telescope and consequent astronomical observations and support for Copernicanism...

, the public debate

1860 Oxford evolution debate

The 1860 Oxford evolution debate took place at the Oxford University Museum on 30 June 1860, seven months after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. Several prominent British scientists and philosophers participated, including Thomas Henry Huxley, Bishop Samuel...

between T. H. Huxley and Bishop Samuel Wilberforce

Samuel Wilberforce

Samuel Wilberforce was an English bishop in the Church of England, third son of William Wilberforce. Known as "Soapy Sam", Wilberforce was one of the greatest public speakers of his time and place...

, the John Scopes trial

Scopes Trial

The Scopes Trial—formally known as The State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes and informally known as the Scopes Monkey Trial—was a landmark American legal case in 1925 in which high school science teacher, John Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee's Butler Act which made it unlawful to...

, and the current controversy between the teaching of evolution and creationism

Creationism

Creationism is the religious beliefthat humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe are the creation of a supernatural being, most often referring to the Abrahamic god. As science developed from the 18th century onwards, various views developed which aimed to reconcile science with the Genesis...

.

Religious text themselves can be the subject of scholarly inquiry via Biblical criticism

Biblical criticism

Biblical criticism is the scholarly "study and investigation of Biblical writings that seeks to make discerning judgments about these writings." It asks when and where a particular text originated; how, why, by whom, for whom, and in what circumstances it was produced; what influences were at work...