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Chapture 3: The Bible and Astronomy
The Bible and Astronomy
To be the Word of God, the
Bible must be true.
This should be self-evident. In recent centuries, however, we find that some scholars
and scientists have made discoveries that, with superficial consideration, seem to
contradict the Bible. Such findings have sent tremors through the Christian world.
An example was a discovery by the Polish astronomer Copernicus, who in the early
16th century concluded that the Western world's prevailing view of the universe was
incorrect. It was an article of faith in the Middle Ages that the earth was the center
of the universe, around which all other heavenly bodies revolved.
Historian William Manchester centuries later wrote that "the world was (believed
to be) an immovable disk around which the sun revolved, and . . . the rest
of the cosmos comprised heaven, which lay dreamily above the skies, inhabited by
cherubs, and hell, flaming deep beneath the European soil. Everyone believed, indeed
knew, that" (William Manchester, A World Lit Only by Fire, Little, Brown
and Company, Boston, 1993, p. 89).
Copernicus, after years of observing the skies and consulting mathematical tables,
arrived at a radically different conclusion: The earth is not a disk about which
the sun rotates; it is a sphere traveling around the sun. His discovery brought shock
and alarm to many religious authorities.
His view was about as welcome to the educated mind during the Middle Ages as the
plague. Upon Copernicus's presentation of his evidence to influential men in education
and religion, his reward was jeers and ridicule. The established church branded Copernicus
as an apostate for challenging the conventional wisdom of the day.
How did this conflict arise? The churchmen had taken their views from Ptolemy, a
Greek astronomer living in Egypt, who had decreed in the second century that the
earth was the center of the universe (ibid., p. 116).
Ptolemy was correct on one important point. It seems he "knew that the earth
was a sphere . . ." (Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, Random House,
New York, 1994, p. 17). Others had previously deduced this as well. "More than
three hundred years before the birth of Christ, Aristotle had determined that the
planet must be a sphere; after an eclipse he had pointed out that only an orb could
throw a circular shadow on the moon" (Manchester, p. 230).
Organized religion of the second century accepted Ptolemy's geocentric view but ultimately
rejected his belief that the earth was spherical. Theologians chose instead to "endorse
the absurd geographical dicta of Topographia Christiana, a treatise by the
sixth-century monk Cosmas . . . who . . . held that the world
was a flat, rectangular plane . . ." (ibid.).
Copernicus was later joined in his heresy by others. The astronomer Galileo confirmed
the findings of Copernicus but recanted under threat of torture. But their scientific
findings could not be restrained forever. The result was a loss of the monopoly that
religion had over men's minds. The Copernican discovery triggered the greatest credibility
crisis that church authorities of the Middle Ages had to face. In defending their
position, they presented human opinion, which could be -- and was -- overturned by scientific
observation and experimentation.
Belief in the Bible and ecclesiastical authority would never be the same. Now a movement
had begun that would eventually, in the minds of many, discredit the Scriptures as
a legitimate source of authority.
Misunderstanding the Scriptures
In reality the Bible was not disproved at all. The misguided interpretations
that men had attached to certain scriptures were discredited. It was not the Bible
that stood corrected, but man's assumptions about what the Bible said.
Ptolemy's erroneous view had been injected into theology in the second century. There
is no evidence that Christ or the apostles believed in this view of creation.
Religious leaders from the second century on were in error about the earth's place
in the scheme of things because of a misunderstanding of various scriptures. They
misunderstood Psalm 93:1, which says that "the world is established, so that
it cannot be moved." This verse does not conflict with the fact that God has
placed the earth in a solar orbit.
We could say that this verse verifies what man has learned from the study of astronomy:
that the earth's behavior is fixed and predictable. God set the earth in its orbit
about the sun and, as the Psalm notes, it will not go careening out of its place
in the heavens because God has determined its orbit and controls the forces that
keep earth in its proper place.
The Bible ahead of its time
When the Renaissance dawned, scholars who awoke to the structure of the solar system
were centuries behind the Bible in basic knowledge of the structure of the universe.
One might wonder how people could have remained in the dark for so long. We must
realize that with the arrival of the Dark Ages man sank deep into an intellectual
and moral morass that lasted from about A.D. 400 to 1000. During this time "intellectual
life . . . vanished from Europe. Even Charlemagne, the first Holy Roman
emperor and the greatest of all medieval rulers, was illiterate." It was a period
of "almost impenetrable mindlessness" (Manchester, p. 3).
The belief that the earth is not the center of the universe died hard. In some places
this new truth was not accepted by religious leaders for more than 300 years after
Copernicus's discoveries. Tremors were felt throughout organized Christianity because
many believed that the astronomical reality cast doubt upon the veracity of the Bible.
In reality it did no such thing. It was not the Bible that was found wanting; it
was the interpretation that had been adopted by religious authorities. The
facts merely confirmed what the Bible had said all along.
The age of the universe
Man's misguided theory of the structure of the universe was the first major astronomical
controversy that pitted science against religion. Many more controversies followed.
One of the most hotly debated concerned the age of the universe.
Astronomers see evidence that the universe is many billions of years old, and generally
believe that it came into existence between 10 and 20 billion years ago through an
event commonly called the Big Bang. Some biblical literalists, on the other hand,
dogmatically maintain that the universe is only about 6,000 years old. They arrive
at this figure by calculating the chronological benchmarks in Genesis and other books
of the Bible.
Astronomers are correct in responding that this view is insupportable. They offer
evidence, gathered from viewing the heavens by powerful telescopes, that support
their position. Asks one, "How is it that there are astronomical objects more
than 6,000 light-years away?" (Sagan, p. 28). A light-year is the distance
that light, moving at 186,000 miles per second, travels in one year.
It is obvious there are light-years between some religious people and science on
this issue. Some advocates of the biblical record reason around such evidence by
stating that the seeming age of the universe (and of the fossil and geological evidence
of the earth itself) is "simply part of 'an appearance of age' that God built
into the universe." Many people, including some theologians, properly respond
that this "raises the problem of a God engaged in deception" (U.S. News
& World Report, Dec. 23, 1991, pp. 59-60).
Yet the arguments are unnecessary. The truth is that the Bible does not contradict
scientific evidence, and science does not disprove the biblical record. The point
missed by most people on both sides of the argument is that the Bible does not
say when the universe was created.
According to the Bible, Adam was the first man (1Corinthians 15:45; 1Chronicles 1:1), and adding the figures in the biblical genealogies yields a date of about 6,000
years ago for Adam's creation.
However, the Bible does not state that the creation of mankind and the creation of
the universe occurred at the same time. The age of the universe is simply
not stated in the Bible. It may well have been 10 or 20 billion years ago. The Big
Bang is simply the most popular of the theories advanced to explain the creation
of an enormous and majestic universe without acknowledging God and the biblical record.
The theory's advocates admit that the universe came into being at a specific moment
(even though they cannot explain the origin of the material from which the Big Bang
supposedly proceeded).
So the Bible agrees with scientists' findings that there was a specific moment of
creation.
In the beginning
Let's turn to Genesis 1 and see what the oft-misunderstood creation account really
says.
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless
and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering
over the waters (Genesis 1:1-2, New International Version).
The first statement in this account refers to God's initial creative act. No exact
time is given as to when this took place. What is evident, from comparing this passage
with other scriptures, is that between verses 1 and 2 something happened to render
the earth "formless and empty."
Isaiah 45:18 tells us that God "did not create (the earth) to be empty, but
formed it to be inhabited . . ." (NIV). The initial creation was followed
by destruction and chaos.
The NIV's alternate reading for verse 2 is, "Now the earth became
formless and empty . . ." This indicates a time difference between
the original creation described in verse 1 and the time leading to the creation of
man beginning in verse 2.
We are not told exactly when the initial creation took place. But the Bible hints
that the original creation was followed by widespread destruction brought about by
the rebellion of Lucifer, who became Satan (Isaiah 14:12-15). Thus the account of
Genesis 1:3-31 is apparently a description of a restoration of the earth just
before the creation of man (Psalm 104:30). Biblical genealogies indicate that this
occurred approximately 6,000 years ago, though nowhere does the Bible tell us the
date when God made Adam and Eve.
God's Word does reveal that initially there was no physical creation -- no earth, no
solar system, no galaxies. The apostle Paul describes this as "before time began"
(Titus 1:2). Then, by divine command, God created the universe.
Science tells us something similar. "These days most cosmologists and astronomers
back the theory that there was indeed a creation . . . when the physical
universe burst into existence in an awesome explosion popularly known as the 'big
bang'. . . . the universe did not always exist" (Paul
Davies, God and the New Physics, Touchstone, New York, 1983, pp. 10-11, emphasis
added).
Both of these accounts, one from science and one from the Bible, speak of an instantaneous
origin of the physical creation.
Why was the universe created?
Science cannot of itself tell us why the earth and the physical creation exist. Wrote
Carl Sagan: "Why it happened is the greatest mystery we know. That it
happened is reasonably clear" (Cosmos, Random House, New York, 1980,
p. 246).
But the Bible tells us why! "You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor
and power; for You created all things, and by Your will they exist and were created"
(Revelation 4:11). Psalm 115:16 adds, "The heaven, even the heavens, are the
Lord's; but the earth He has given to the children of men."
God created all things. He set aside the earth as a place of habitation for man,
for the working out of His purpose. His magnificent plan is ultimately to bring "many
sons to glory" (Hebrews 2:10), to offer sonship to all people through His Son
Jesus Christ. This is the wonderful reason God brought the creation into existence
by His command. The Bible explains God's plan in considerable detail -- as well as that
plan's implications for us. (For a more complete explanation, please request our
free booklet What Is Your Destiny?)
The Bible holds true in its description of the origin of all things. In response
to the statement that God in the beginning created the heavens and the earth, one
skeptical scientist stated, "But no one was there to see it" (Davies, p.
9). Not true: God was there. There was no human being there to refute it,
and there is no one who can refute it today. No man or woman has disproved the Bible.
But there is a mountain of evidence to show it is true.
©1999 United Church of God, an International Associtaion
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