Van Huyssteen J.W. (editor) Encyclopedia of Science and Religion

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CHINESE RELIGIONS,HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND RELIGION IN CHINA

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regarded calendar making as one of his duties as-

sociated with the mandate that he received from

heaven. The calendar, issued in the emperor’s

name, became part of the ritual paraphernalia that

demonstrated his dynastic right to rule. Astrological

observations could easily be manipulated and thus

could be dangerous in the hands of someone try-

ing to undermine the current dynasty. It was there-

fore a principle of state policy that the proper

place to conduct astronomical studies was the im-

perial court. During certain periods it was illegal to

do it elsewhere. Thus, an ancient scientific pursuit

such as astronomy was deeply embedded in the

social matrix of ancient China, although Chinese

astronomy could not be pursued as an independ-

ent activity like its modern western counterpart.

Medicine. Classical Chinese medicine has often

been represented as an empirical science that is

based on the clinically sound use of effective natu-

ral drugs and other remedies. Scientific theories

served primarily as mnemonic devices or as mysti-

fication to confuse the untrained. Some scholars

portray classical Chinese medicine as a corpus of

theory-based adaptations of the yin-yang and five-

agents concepts. As such, the body was understood

as a multilevel interconnected system, and illnesses

were treated holistically. The most famous medical

texts were compiled before the Qin period (before

211

B.C.E.) and completed during the Han dynasty.

Among extant texts, the most important are

Huangdi Neijing (Yellow Emperor’s inner canon)

and Shennong Bencao Jing (Divine husbandry’s

classic of herbology), which laid the foundation for

clinical science with definite treatment and diag-

nostic principles. Chinese pharmacology also re-

veals outstanding achievements during this period.

Shennong’s Classic of Herbology presents many ef-

fective remedies. It also provides the theoretical

basis of drug use, as well as the collection, preser-

vation, and mixing of herbs, and their methods of

administration.

From the second century

C.E. onward, medical

disciplines were professionalized. Clinical medi-

cine developed greatly from the third to the tenth

centuries. The Zouhou Beiji Fang (Handbook of

prescription for emergency) in the fourth century

includes information on smallpox and a treatment

for hydrophobia that used the brain tissue of a

mad dog. The academic standard of Chinese med-

icine was further upgraded during the Ming and

Qing dynasties (1368–1911

C.E.). A new medical

school was established to study acute infections,

and researchers there successfully tackled many in-

fectious diseases, including B-encephalitis, acute

viral hepatitis, and other viral diseases.

Chinese medicine never produced a detailed

and accurate picture of anatomy and physiology.

The philosophical concept of yin-yang was the

basic theory for interpreting complex relationships

between the upper and lower emotions, the inner

basis and the outer manifestations of the body’s ac-

tivities and functions. Moreover, classical Chinese

medicine was not concerned with microorganisms

or details of the body’s organs and tissues. The

strength of classical Chinese medical discourse lies

rather in its sophisticated analysis of how bodily

functions are related on many levels, from the vital

processes of the body to the emotions, to the nat-

ural and social environment of the patient. In this

sense, traditional Chinese medicine stresses a ho-

listic view of health rather than analytical research

on the physical body.

See also CHINESE RELIGIONS AND SCIENCE; CHINESE

RELIGIONS, CONFUCIANISM AND SCIENCE IN CHINA;

HINESE RELIGIONS, DAOISM AND SCIENCE IN CHINA

Bibliography

Chan, Wing-tsit. A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy.

Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1963.

Chen, Bangzian. A History of Chinese Medicine. Beijing:

Commercial Press, 1957.

Ching, Julia. Chinese Religions. New York: Orbis, 1993.

Ho, Peng Hoke. Li, Qi and Shu: An Introduction to Sci-

ence and Civilization in China. Hong Kong: Hong

Kong University Press, 1985. Reprint edition, Mineola,

N.Y.: Dover, 2000.

Needham, Joseph. Science and Civilisation in China, Vol.

2: History of Scientific Thought. Cambridge, UK: Cam-

bridge University Press, 1956.

Ropp, Paul S., ed. Heritage of China: Contemporary Per-

spectives on Chinese Civilization. Berkeley: University

of California Press, 1990.

Yeung, Hing kau. “The Meaning of Theological Knowl-

edge in the Western Dualism and the Chinese Cos-

mology.” Jian Dao 5 (1996): 51–64.

Ying, Siu-leung. Zhongguo Chuantong Kexue Sixiang

Yanjiu (A Study on the Thought of Traditional Chi-

nese Science). Nanchang, China: JiangXi People’s

Publisher, 2001.

HING KAU YEUNG

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CHRISTIANITY

Christians were first called “Christians,” according

to Acts 11: 26, at Antioch in 40 to 44

C.E. A Christ-

ian is one who accepts Jesus of Nazareth as Mes-

siah (or in Greek, the Christ), the Anointed One of

God—the one who shows and makes present in

history God’s nature and purpose for creation.

Normally Christians believe in one creator

God, threefold in being (Father, Son, and Spirit).

The Son is the Logos or Wisdom of God, the ar-

chetype of all creation, who was incarnate in

Jesus, reconciling an estranged creation to the di-

vine being through Jesus’ death and resurrection.

The Spirit, the creative energy of God, is known in

the fellowship of the Church, which mediates the

presence of the risen Christ to the world. Chris-

tians believe that human beings have turned away

from the love of God to selfish desire (are “in

sin”), but God wills that all should turn back to

God, and in Christ calls them and empowers them

to return. At the end of history, Christ will be dis-

closed in glory, and all who have not finally re-

jected God will receive the gift of eternal life in the

presence of God. The “gospel,” or good news, is

that God forgives sin and offers eternal life to all

through Christ.

Christianity has expanded from a small Jewish

messianic sect to become the largest religion in the

world, with an estimated two billion adherents. It

has taken many forms, and there are well over a

thousand Christian denominations. Some denomi-

nations think of themselves as “Biblical Christians,”

meaning that they take the Bible as the basis of

faith, and often interpret the historical records, in-

cluding accounts of miracles and of the coming

end of the world, as literally as possible. Such

groups sometimes find themselves in conflict with

the claims of science, most obviously over the age

of the universe, the origin of human life, and the

probable end of the world.

The mainstream denominations—especially

Roman Catholic, Reformed, Lutheran and Angli-

can—are not committed to biblical literalism. It has

become standard to interpret the Genesis accounts

and teachings about the end of the world as myths,

the purpose of which is to teach the dependence

of all things on God, and the final destiny of the

universe as lying in union with (or final separation

from) God. More radical movements seek to re-

construct Christian faith in terms of personal com-

mitment to agapistic love (to the kingdom of God,

seen as a moral community), or of apprehension of

the Transcendent, as it is disclosed in Jesus. Nev-

ertheless, belief in God as creator is usually af-

firmed, and Jesus is seen as a unique instance of

God’s action in the world, from whose life, death,

and resurrection the church originates, as the way

of reconciling the world to God. The experimental

sciences have flourished in this intellectual envi-

ronment, since it affirms the rational intelligibility

of the universe, as created by a wise God, and

gives humans the responsibility for having “do-

minion” over, or care for, the creation.

See also CHRISTIANITY, ANGLICAN, ISSUES IN SCIENCE AND

RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY, EVANGELICAL, ISSUES IN

SCIENCE AND RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY, LUTHERAN,

SSUES IN SCIENCE AND RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY,

RTHODOX, ISSUES IN SCIENCE AND RELIGION;

HRISTIANITY, PENTECOSTALISM, ISUSES IN SCIENCE AND

RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY, RADICAL REFORMED, ISSUES IN

SCIENCE AND RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY, REFORMED,

SSUES IN SCIENCE AND RELIGION; CHRISTIANITY, ROMAN

CATHOLIC, ISSUES IN SCIENCE AND RELIGION; SCIENCE

AND

RELIGION, HISTORY OF FIELD

Bibliography

McManners, John, ed. The Oxford Illustrated History of

Christianity. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990.

Ward, Keith. Christianity: A Short Introduction. Oxford:

Oneworld Press, 2000.

KEITH WARD

CHRISTIANITY,ANGLICAN,

SSUES IN SCIENCE AND

RELIGION

The initial impulse given to Anglican thought in the

sixteenth century was a confident belief in God as

creator of the world, which, though fallen, was in-

telligible to human understanding. From biblical,

patristic, and medieval sources, Anglican liturgy

gave expression to the praise of God, notably in the

daily use of the book of Psalms, and of canticles

such as the Benedicite and Te Deum. Although ini-

tially the reformed Church of England understood

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itself as a form of Protestantism, the vision of bal-

ancing God’s work in creation and in human his-

tory was somewhat distinctive, giving its thought a

somewhat less anthropocentric character.

Views of nature

This positive perspective on nature comes to ex-

pression in the classic theology of Richard Hooker

(1554–1600). Within a generally hierarchical and

Aristotelian view of nature, Hooker insists on God’s

work as artist, guide, and providential director

within nature. Its constancy and dependability are

the source of human knowledge of its laws. Natural

objects are moved by God as instruments of his

being. The same theme is also evident in the poetry

of George Herbert (1593–1633), who assigns to hu-

manity the role of being secretary to the praise of-

fered by the whole of creation. A very powerful

and individual voice is that of the Anglican poet

Thomas Traherne (1636–1674), who takes a mysti-

cal delight in the beauty of the created order.

Interaction with the sciences

Certain specific conditions made England a partic-

ularly hospitable place for the burgeoning of natu-

ral theology after the condemnation of Galileo

Galilei (1564–1642) in 1616 and 1633. The found-

ing of the Royal Society of London for the Im-

provement of Natural Knowledge (known as the

Royal Society) in 1660 benefited both from the

comparatively loose structure of authority in the

Church of England and from a certain degree of

toleration of diversity of opinion. In fact, Thomas

Sprat (1635–1713), the first writer of the history of

the Royal Society, wrote, “The Church of England

therefore may justly be styl’d the Mother of this

sort of Knowledge; and so the care of its nourish-

ment and prosperity peculiarly lyes upon it”

(quoted in Peacocke, p. 5).

Isaac Newton (1643–1727) was an Anglican

reared in the scholasticism of Cambridge, but open

to the new influences from mechanical philosophy.

In his Opticks (1706) Newton assigned to God the

duties of preventing the stars from collapsing to-

gether and of reforming the mechanism of the

world to prevent it from subversion by irregulari-

ties. The rationalism of this scheme was comple-

mented by his approach to Scripture, which he de-

nied taught the doctrine of the Trinity. But it is clear

that Newton was by intention a pious believer and

theological thinker as well as a brilliant scientist.

The same atmosphere of toleration supported

the scientific work of non-Anglican Protestants, no-

table among whom was the naturalist and theolo-

gian, John Ray (1627–1705). A fellow of the Royal

Society, Ray’s exceptional work of taxonomy was

carried outside the Anglican universities, and his

late work, The Wisdom of God Manifested in the

Works of the Creation (1691), advanced the argu-

ment from design influential throughout the com-

ing century.

Although mechanistic philosophy was strongly

attacked by many Anglican theological writers (and

poets) of the eighteenth century, the teleological

argument for the existence of God remained pop-

ular, receiving influential expression in the work of

the philosopher William Paley (1743–1805), an An-

glican priest, and author of a standard textbook,

Natural History (1802). This book was studied by

Charles Darwin (1809–1882) as a student, and its

arguments are still worthy of consideration.

An attempt to find a version of the mechanical

philosophy compatible with theism was a feature

of the Cambridge scientist, ethicist, and theologian,

William Whewell (1794–1866). An ordained Angli-

can as well as a founding member and early pres-

ident of the British Association for the Advance-

ment of Science and a Fellow of the Royal Society,

Whewell stressed the inductive and historical char-

acter of science. At the same time he held that

God’s creation of the world guaranteed the sim-

plicity and comprehensibility of the laws govern-

ing nature.

Darwin’s own discoveries and writings pro-

vided, and still provide, an enormous stimulus to

Anglican, as well as to all English-language theol-

ogy. The dominant idealism of late nineteenth-cen-

tury English universities had little difficulty in

adapting to the implications of Darwinian thought,

and Darwin himself was buried, without contro-

versy, in Westminster Abbey.

The dialogue since Darwin

After Darwin and the opening of Oxford and Cam-

bridge to non-Anglicans, it became more difficult

to identify a specifically Anglican strand in the gen-

erally vibrant relations of science and theology.

After the second world war, however, a further

burgeoning took place in Anglican responses to

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scientific developments. In 1942 an Anglican the-

ologian, Charles E. Raven (1885–1964), produced

a major biographical study of John Ray, following

it later with a two-volume history of religion

and science (Natural Religion and Christian The-

ology, 1953).

From the 1970s two authors, both Anglican

priests, biologist Arthur Peacocke (1924– ) and

physicist John Polkinghorne (1930– ) have made

major contributions. For Peacocke the theological

interpretation of how God is related to the world

must be rethought in the direction of panentheism,

God suffering in and with the world processes. For

Polkinghorne, God is active within the world,

though in a self-limited, kenotic way.

Attempts to popularize the discoveries of sci-

ence have led to a continuing public interest and

debate, especially on the ethical problems of gene

technology. Notable contributions have been made

by an Anglican bishop and geneticist, John Hab-

good (1927– ), Archbishop of York from 1983

to 1995.

See also DARWIN, CHARLES; NATURAL THEOLOGY;

EWTON, ISAAC; PANENTHEISM

Bibliography

Habgood, John. Religion and Science. London: Hodder

and Stoughton, 1972.

Newton, Isaac. Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflections,

Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light (1706).

4th edition. London: Bell and Sons, 1931.

Paley, William. Natural History: or, Evidences of the Exis-

tence and Attributes of the Deity, Collected from the

Appearances of Nature (1802). Cambridge, UK:

Chadwyck-Healey, 1998.

Peacocke, Arthur R. Creation and the World of Science:

The Brampton Lectures, 1978. Oxford: Clarendon

Press, 1979.

Polkinghorne, John C. Belief in God in an Age of

Science. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University

Press, 1998.

Polkinghorne, John C. Science and Theology: An Intro-

duction. London: SPCK/Fortress, 1998.

Raven, Charles E. Natural Religion and Christian Theol-

ogy: The Gifford Lectures, 1951. First Series: Science

and Religion. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University

Press, 1953.

Ray, John. The Wisdom of God Manifest in the Works of

Creation. (1691). London and New York: Olms,

1974.

Whewell, William. The Philosophy of the Inductive Sci-

ences, Founded Upon Their History, New edition,

2 vols. London: J. W. Parker, 1847.

STEPHEN SYKES

CHRISTIANITY,

VANGELICAL,ISSUES IN

SCIENCE AND RELIGION

The term evangelical (from the Greek word for

gospel) has several meanings; for the purpose of

this entry, it will refer to an English-speaking

Protestant development that emphasizes personal

religion (focused on Christ), Biblical authority and

preaching, missions, and evangelism. The origins of

this particular type of evangelical Christianity

stretch back to eighteenth-century revivals in Eng-

land and America, with such leading figures as John

and Charles Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, and George

Whitefield. Early evangelical leaders and scholars

accepted a harmony between natural science and

religious faith, typical of the age of British natural

theology. Edwards saw the glory of God revealed

in a spider’s web, while Wesley could find the wis-

dom of God revealed in creation as understood by

the natural science of his day. For the most part,

evangelical scientists and theologians sought a har-

mony between science and Scripture.

Views of nature

Evangelicals understand the natural world in terms

of Biblical theism and the doctrine of creation. God

is the author of nature and of the contingent order

of the natural world. Nature was created good, and

exists for the purpose of glorifying God. Sin, how-

ever, has distorted and warped nature, especially

human nature. God will eventually redeem nature

and all things through Christ. Thus the natural

world serves as a stage for the great drama of sal-

vation: sin and corruption, salvation and redemp-

tion. Because it is subject to a higher, spiritual

order, evangelicals believe that the stability of nat-

ural law may be altered for a higher purpose, with-

out undermining the reliability of natural science.

They defend both the value of natural science and

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the stability of natural law, along with the reality of

miracles in the context of God’s plan for nature

and history.

Interaction with the sciences

With a few exceptions, the general picture of har-

mony between faith and science did not change in

any marked degree after the publication of Charles

Darwin’s Origin of Species in 1859. Given the vitri-

olic rejection of Darwinism by populist evangeli-

cals in the early twentieth century, this may seem

unlikely; but the fact is that most evangelical schol-

ars and natural scientists before World War I ac-

cepted some form of evolution, even if some were

attracted to non-Darwinian variations, such as that

of Jean Baptiste Lamarck. They rejected “Darwin-

ism” when that term was identified with atheism or

naturalism (e.g., the Princeton theologian Charles

Hodge). Prominent evangelical theologians and

scientists of the late nineteenth century, such as

James Orr, B. B. Warfield, and A. H. Strong (the-

ologians), or James D. Dana, David Brewster, and

Asa Gray (scientists), could all advocate a combi-

nation of biological evolution and Biblical religion.

There were, of course, critics of evolution among

evangelicals in this period, but that was not the

dominant mood. The scientific and religious critics

of Darwin in the nineteenth century came from a

great variety of religious perspectives, and cannot

be typified as predominantly evangelical.

After the first World War, the cultural mood

changed in the West, and among evangelicals. The

horrors of war stimulated a more world-denying,

counter-cultural popular religion. Pre-millennial

eschatology became popular in the new move-

ment, soon called “fundamentalism.” This escha-

tology expected the imminent return of Jesus and

the decline of worldly culture until his return. In

this populist movement, evolution was associated

with progress, with liberalism, and even with bib-

lical criticism. Because the Book of Revelation was

read in a literal way, so was Genesis. Evolution

and Darwin were rejected in favor of biblical liter-

alism and tribulation preaching in which the

“tribulation” is the period of woes and sufferings

predicted in Revelation. The main spokespersons

for this populist pre-millennial movement were not

scholars and scientists but preachers and pam-

phleteers. This is the reason the famous Scopes

trial in Dayton, Tennessee, took place in 1925 after

the rise of fundamentalism, and not earlier. The

anti-evolutionary forces in Dayton were lead by

the populist politician William Jennings Bryan, not

by scholars. It is no accident that the first major

“creation scientists” was an Adventist (George Mc-

Cready Price) because of the close association of

populist pre-millennial eschatology and anti-evo-

lutionary rhetoric in American church history. The

rise of this kind of fundamentalism also marked

the end of the harmony between natural science

and biblical religion as a predominant mood

within evangelicalism.

The so-called creation science movement was

an attempt to give this anti-evolutionary point of

view some scientific respectability. Henry Morris

was particularly influential, but few serious biolo-

gists joined this association. Despite the work of the

Institute for Creation Research in Santee, California,

and other loose associations of creationists, creation

science has remained a populist movement with lit-

tle scientific respectability. It thrives predominantly

within pre-millennial movements, rather than

among associations of scientists and scholars. Like

earlier fundamentalists, they are often accused of

relying upon popular politics, rather than scientific

literature, to oppose evolution.

The dialogue since World War II

After the Second World War, some conservative

scholars and church leaders saw a need to engage

with culture, including science. Carl Henry,

Bernard Ramm, and E. J. Carnell, along with Eng-

lish evangelicals like John Stott, were among the

theologians who advocated a rejection of funda-

mentalism and a return to social engagement and

scholarly achievements. In his influential book A

Christian View of Science and Scripture (1954),

Ramm reasserted the older evangelical harmony

between science, including evolution, and the

Bible. Associations of evangelicals who were also

scientists, such as the American Scientific Affilia-

tion (ASA) and the Victoria Institute in England,

help promote this reengagement. In 1959, mem-

bers of the ASA, a group previously noted for its

anti-evolutionary stance, published Russell Mix-

ter’s Evolution and Christian Thought Today, a

controversial work cautiously in favor of scientific

evolution.

Given this complex history, evangelical schol-

ars and scientists remain conflicted with respect to

evolution. Unlike their fundamentalist ancestors,

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evangelicals embrace natural science and scholar-

ship in general. The majority of evangelical schol-

ars would advocate a Christian approach to the sci-

ences that unites faith and reason, rather than the

anti-intellectual rhetoric of the fundamentalist

movement. But with respect to evolution, some

evangelicals remain dubious. In particular, the In-

telligent Design movement (popular among evan-

gelicals) includes scientists, philosophers, and the-

ologians who argue that life on Earth is the result

of intelligent design. They seek to reject Darwin-

ism, as they understand it, while still accepting nat-

ural science as a whole. On the other hand, many

evangelical systematic theologians like Thomas F.

Torrance are willing to accept biological evolution,

while still holding that the universe is created, sus-

tained, and ordered by God.

See also CREATIONISM; DARWIN, CHARLES; DESIGN;

NTELLIGENT DESIGN; SCIENCE AND RELIGION,

ODELS AND RELATIONS

Bibliography

Carlson, Richard F., ed. Science and Christianity: Four

Views. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2000.

Behe, Michael; Dembski, William; and Meyer, Stephen.

Science and Evidence for Design in the Universe. San

Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000.

Lewis, C. S. Miracles. New York: Macmillan, 1947.

Livingstone, David N. Darwin’s Forgotten Defenders: The

Encounter Between Evangelical Theology and Evolu-

tionary Thought. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans,

1987.

Livingstone, David; Hart; D. G.; and Noll, Mark, eds.

Evangelicals and Science in Historical Perspective.

New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Mixter, Russell Lowell, ed. Evolution and Christian

Thought Today. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1959.

Numbers, Ronald. The Creationists. New York: Knopf,

1992.

Ramm, Bernard. A Christian View of Science and Scrip-

ture. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1954.

Sandeen, Ernest R. The Roots of Fundamentalism: British

and American Millenarianism, 1800-1930. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 1970.

Torrance, Thomas F. Divine and Contingent Order. Ox-

ford: Oxford University Press, 1981.

ALAN G. PADGETT

CHRISTIANITY,HISTORY OF

SCIENCE AND RELIGION

The fundamental question facing the Christian

scholar in any discipline can be seen as a specific

form of a general query that was posed within two

centuries of Christ’s death by the Carthaginian fa-

ther Tertullian (c. 155–230): “What indeed has

Athens to do with Jerusalem? What concord is

there between the Academy and the Church?”

Before the Renaissance

As the phrasing implies, Tertullian’s attitude toward

Greek philosophy was generally negative, though

he acknowledged a legitimate role for reason

within the bounds of religion. Other patristic au-

thors looked more favorably on pagan philosophy

and literature, especially Origen (c. 185–254), who

required his students to read nearly every work

available to them at the time and found some truth

in most of them. The moderate position of Augus-

tine of Hippo (354–430), who considered reason a

divine gift resting on the foundation of faith, was

by far the most influential on later Christian think-

ing. Although he cautioned Christians not to de-

vote too much energy to the study of nature,

which cannot lead to salvation, Augustine recog-

nized Greek scientists as reliable authorities on

natural matters and cautioned Christians against

making nonsensical claims about nature, based on

some presumed meaning of scripture, for this

would only cause people to laugh at the ignorance

of Christians. He also urged believers to study na-

ture, “the great book . . . of created things.”

Most patristic writers recognized two valid

sources of knowledge—scripture and reason, in-

cluding most conclusions of reason about nature—

but assigned a different status to each. Prior to the

Renaissance, philosophy (including what is today

called science) was considered a “handmaiden to

theology,” while theology was “queen of the sci-

ences,” where “science” meant knowledge in gen-

eral and not simply knowledge of nature. This ter-

minology was introduced by the Hellenistic Jewish

scholar Philo of Alexandria (30

B.C.E.–50 C.E.) and

later was used by Christian writers such as

Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–215), Augustine,

and Bonaventure (1221–1274). On this view, the

proper role of scientific knowledge was to help il-

luminate biblical references to nature, not to stand

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on its own as an independent domain of inquiry.

This is clearly seen in the numerous commentaries

on the six days of creation from this period, such

as the Homilies on the Hexameron by Basil,

Bishop of Caesarea (c. 330–379), in which Aris-

totelian cosmology and physics were used to help

interpret references to the heavens in the first

chapter of Genesis.

For nearly twelve hundred years the hand-

maiden model escaped serious challenge, mainly

because copies of most Greek scientific and med-

ical texts were unavailable in northern and western

Europe, and what little knowledge Christian schol-

ars did have of such texts was usually obtained in-

directly, from handbooks and encyclopedias rather

than from the original sources. Consequently,

Christian scholars were not confronted with the full

force of Aristotle’s sophisticated naturalism. On the

other hand, they did have Plato’s Timaeus, a dia-

logue about creation in which a god imposes

mathematical form on undifferentiated matter. Al-

though the differences between Plato’s story and

Genesis are significant, there are enough similari-

ties that Plato was readily seen as a pagan prophet

of Christianity. Plato’s rejection of purely natural

and unintelligent causes in forming the world, cou-

pled with his belief in the immortality of the soul

and the superiority of mind over matter, made him

highly attractive to Christian writers. The relative

ease with which Platonic elements could be incor-

porated into a Christian world view—and vice

versa, depending on who was doing the philoso-

phizing—gave considerable support to the hand-

maiden model.

The situation changed dramatically with the

reintroduction into northern and western Europe

of a large body of Greek scientific and medical

works. This process began around 1000

C.E. and

led within two centuries to the appearance of uni-

versities dominated by Aristotelian natural philoso-

phy, strongly flavored by the ideas of Islamic

scholars who had worked with translations of

Greek texts for hundreds of years. The influence of

Ibn Rushd (known in the West as Averroës,

1126–1198), an extreme rationalist who elevated

Aristotle over traditional Islamic teaching, was es-

pecially important in this connection. Christian

scholars were now faced with a powerful, system-

atic body of natural knowledge, comprehensive in

scope and secular in spirit, and they responded in

various ways.

At the University of Paris, the leading theolog-

ical faculty in Christendom, led by the conservative

Bonaventure, grew alarmed at certain teachings

promulgated by some masters on the faculty of

arts, especially Siger of Brabant, a radical Aris-

totelian who considered philosophy to be an au-

tonomous discipline, perhaps even superior to the-

ology. Several times in the thirteenth century,

Aristotle’s books were banned at Paris, culminating

in 1277 when the bishop of Paris, Étienne Tempier,

condemned 219 specific propositions as heretical.

These included several ideas associated with

Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225–1274), a moderate Do-

minican who had taught theology at Paris and had

carefully integrated Aristotle with Christian theol-

ogy. Ironically, Aquinas was canonized in 1323

and his ideas later became the basis for one of the

leading Christian systems of thought, Thomism. A

further irony is that the condemnation inspired

the important Parisian natural philosophers John

Buridan (c. 1295–1358) and Nicole Oresme (c.

1320–1382) to consider what a non-Aristotelian sci-

ence of motion might be like, including the possi-

bility of a rotating Earth. Although their ideas

probably did not lead directly to the scientific rev-

olution (as Pierre Duhem and some others have

claimed), they do show that theology can stimulate

significant scientific insights.

Renaissance to mid-nineteenth century

In the later middle ages and continuing into the Re-

naissance, partly in reaction to the hold Aris-

totelianism had gained on the universities, Platon-

ism enjoyed a revival. Many Renaissance thinkers

followed Plato by emphasizing mathematics as the

key to understanding nature, but differed funda-

mentally from Plato in their belief that the physical

world perfectly embodies God’s geometrical de-

sign; Plato had taught that physical objects are only

imperfect “shadows” of the perfect forms. The dif-

ference was a consequence of the Christian doc-

trine of creation: An omnipotent God would carry

out the plan of creation to perfection. For Christian

neo-Platonists like Nicolas Copernicus (1473–1543),

Galileo Galilei (1564–1642), and Johannes Kepler

(1571–1630), God was eternally thinking geometric

thoughts. By the right use of geometry, one might

literally read the mind of God and discover the

deepest secrets of creation. Inspired partly by his

neo-Platonist beliefs and strongly encouraged by

church authorities to publish his ideas, the quiet

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and conservative Copernicus advanced a radical

new theory of the universe that placed the Earth in

motion about a stationary sun. Kepler found this

theory attractive for several reasons, including his

belief that the three parts of the Copernican uni-

verse symbolized the Trinity—the central sun with

its emanating light representing God the Father, the

starry sphere God the Son, and the intermediate

space God the Holy Spirit.

There was no convincing proof for the new as-

tronomy, however, and many scientists and theolo-

gians alike saw the hypothesis of the Earth’s motion

as a challenge to those biblical passages (about a

dozen in all) that seemed to speak either of the mo-

tion of the sun through the sky, as if it were a real

motion rather than an apparent one, or else of the

stability of the Earth. In defense of the new astron-

omy, Kepler (a German Protestant) and Galileo (an

Italian Catholic) both employed the Augustinian

principle of accommodation to justify the figurative

interpretation of biblical references to the motion of

the sun. The Bible, they argued, speaks in a human

way about ordinary matters in a way that can be un-

derstood by the common person, using ordinary

speech to convey loftier theological truths. Thus,

the literal sense of texts making reference to nature

should not be mistaken for accurate scientific state-

ments, but the wise interpreter could show how the

book of scripture did not really contradict the book

of nature. Citing rules established by the Council of

Trent in response to Protestant reformers, Catholic

authorities found this unacceptable and ordered

Galileo not to teach the new astronomy. Galileo,

who often treated opponents arrogantly, ignored

this warning and published a vigorous attack on

traditional astronomy in which he thoughtlessly in-

sulted his friend, Pope Urban VIII, and Galileo was

sentenced to house arrest by the Inquisition in 1633.

Those Christian thinkers who agreed with Ke-

pler and Galileo—and by 1700 a large number

did—were implicitly raising the status of science

from that of an obedient handmaiden to something

like an equal partner in the search for truth—a

conception that had been explicitly endorsed just a

few years earlier by the English statesman and es-

sayist, Francis Bacon (1561–1626), who was ironi-

cally not a Copernican himself. Bacon held that

nature served as a “key” to the scriptures, not only

by “opening our understanding to conceive the

true sense of the scriptures,” but mainly by “open-

ing our belief, in drawing us into a due meditation

of the omnipotency of God, which is chiefly signed

and engraven upon his works.” At the same time,

however, he cautioned against “unwisely con-

founding these learnings together.”

Because it offered relative autonomy for sci-

ence while enhancing the authority of theology,

the Baconian attitude was widely adopted by

Protestants in England and America through the

middle of the nineteenth century, and Roman

Catholics were increasingly attracted to a similar at-

titude, partly seen in Galileo but ultimately derived

from Aquinas. English natural philosopher Robert

Boyle (1627–1691) epitomized this approach, pro-

moting what he called the “mechanical philoso-

phy”—the explanation of natural phenomena in

terms of matter and motion—over Aristotelian and

Galenic views, for its advantages not only to sci-

ence (it provided clear, experimentally useful ex-

planations) but also to religion: By denying any

immanent intelligence to “Nature,” which func-

tioned idolatrously as a “semi-deity,” the mechani-

cal philosophy more clearly distinguished the cre-

ator from the creation, thus focusing worship

where it properly belonged. Boyle further believed

that Christian character was highly relevant to the

scientific enterprise, such that he considered him-

self a “priest of nature” whose discoveries only en-

hanced his appreciation for the wisdom, goodness,

and power of God. Like many of his contempo-

raries, including Isaac Newton (1642–1727), Boyle

aggressively pursued an extensive program of nat-

ural theology while generally avoiding the use of

the Bible as a scientific text.

More than a century later, however, Christian

thinkers were much less reluctant to cite scripture

on scientific matters, no doubt because the age and

origin of the Earth had become topics of serious sci-

entific discussion. Many natural historians and the-

ologians saw in the books of nature and scripture

essentially the same story, going beyond the general

assumption of harmony to endorse a strong con-

cordism, arguing for close parallels between Gene-

sis and geology and sometimes inventing elaborate

hermeneutical schemes to achieve harmonization.

Since the mid-nineteenth century

With the acceptance of Darwinian evolution, how-

ever, concordism fell out of favor, though some

conservative Protestants still embrace it, and no

single approach to theology and science has gen-

erated a wide enough following to function as its

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replacement. The first American Darwinian,

botanist Asa Gray (1810–1888), thought that his ac-

ceptance of evolution had no bearing on his belief

in the miracles of Christ and the doctrines affirmed

by the Nicene Creed, thus holding a compatibilist

or complementarian view of theology and science.

At the same time, Gray tried to rebuild natural the-

ology along evolutionary lines—a combination that

has never been common, although a number of

orthodox and neo-orthodox thinkers in the follow-

ing century held some type of complementarian

position.

From the 1870s to the 1920s, many Protestant

scientists and theologians and some Roman

Catholics believed that higher biblical criticism, as

well as natural science, mandated the formulation

of a new theology stressing divine immanence,

God’s everyday working in and through the

processes of nature. Some liberals took this further,

including several modernists from the 1920s who

denied miracles and special revelation and essen-

tially identified God with the laws of nature, thus

completely rejecting divine transcendence. Liberals

saw morality as the essence of religion; asserting

the fundamental goodness and perfectibility of hu-

manity, many also believed that the science of eu-

genics would help them establish the kingdom of

God on Earth. Both world wars had a devastating

impact on such an optimistic view, leading Karl

Barth (1886–1968) and other neo-orthodox theolo-

gians to reassert sin, revelation, and divine tran-

scendence. Because he understood God as wholly

other, and also because he deplored the ways in

which the German churches had capitulated to the

state, Barth denied that one can learn about God

apart from revelation, thereby completely rejecting

natural theology.

Around the same time, the English logician Al-

fred North Whitehead (1861–1947) argued that the

very possibility of modern science depended upon

the unconsciously held belief, derived from me-

dieval theology, that the created order must be in-

telligible, thus finding an inextricable link between

theology and science. He also developed a highly

sophisticated process metaphysics that has pro-

foundly influenced some important modern theolo-

gians, philosophers, and scientists. Motivated partly

by a desire to embrace evolution and even more by

a desire to mitigate God’s responsibility for suffer-

ing, process theologians believe that God has only

limited power to influence natural and human

events, rather than the omnipotence needed to cre-

ate the world ex nihilo. The world and God are

seen as coeval entities evolving together, and many

contemporary process thinkers follow Charles

Hartshorne (1897–2000) in affirming panentheism

rather than traditional theism. Ironically, perhaps

the greatest challenge to process theology comes

from the modern science it seeks to embrace, but

from the evolution of the cosmos rather than the

evolution of life. Since the mid-1960s, astronomers

have discovered a wealth of evidence favoring the

Big Bang theory of cosmology, evidence suggesting

not only that the universe had a “beginning” but

also that the laws of nature were exquisitely tuned

for the presence of living things. Many think that a

universe with these features seems more consistent

with creatio ex nihilo than its denial.

At the dawn of the twenty-first century, a good

number of leading Christian scientists and theolo-

gians, including some who combine that role,

such as Ian Barbour (1923– ), Arthur Peacocke

(1924– ), and John Polkinghorne (1930– ), are en-

gaged in a growing international conversation

about issues of interest to both communities, and

the range of opinion reflects disagreements about

the nature of God, the nature of humanity, and the

nature of nature.