Dear Theophilus, 

You, as many others, are experiencing anxiety and doubt, particularly in the field of religion and its relationship to science. So, let us take a closer look at some of your concerns.

The onslaught against Christianity reached its apex towards the end of the last and beginning, of this century. With respect to the Old Testament, it was dogmatically stated by Wellhausen in 1895 that in no way could Moses' authorship of the first five books of the Bible be supported because writing did not exist in Israel at around BC 1500. His view was that the Old Testament was a collection of Hebrew myths and legends written around BC 600. As far as the New Testament went, this was dated around the end of the second century AD with parts of it being composed in the third century. The New Testament was seen as a collection of legends that accrued around some vague personality, Jesus, and did not correspond to any historical occurrences. On paper, this all looked very imposing but, truth will out, and archeological discoveries changed things very dramatically. It was conclusively shown that writing existed in the Middle East as early as BC 1600. No one could show that the prophecies in the Old Testament were made after the fact. In fact, a prophecy made in the Old Testament by the prophets, was fulfilled before our very eyes as Israel became a state in 1948. A fragment of John's Gospel was found and was dated at AD 125. According to the critics, the Gospel of John was the last one to be written and therefore, the other Gospels must have been written much earlier. There is a curious fact that attests to this. Something happened in the first century which had a profound affect on Jewish Christians and Jews. In AD 68, Roman armies laid siege to Jerusalem which held out for two years finally succumbing in AD 70. Along with the conquest of Jerusalem, the second temple was destroyed and this was a calamitous event for Jews. Yet, if you were to read the New Testament from beginning to end, there is no mention of this, not even a hint that this has occurred. In view of this, it has been recently proposed by a radical critic of the New Testament, J.A.T. Robinson, that the whole of the New Testament was completed before AD 70, not giving enough time to permit legends and myths to grow or historical facts to be manipulated.

But I'm sure that this is not all that bothers you, Theophilus. You have this question, this doubt lurking in the back of your mind that somehow questions the New Testament as unscientific and unfactual. I think that the reason why people feel this way is that they lack a clear understanding of how science operates and they a clear understanding of what their faith really says as opposed to hearsay from others. In one of the parables, Jesus talks about a man who built his house on sand and when the sand gave way, the house collapsed. Anyone who bases his faith on scientific laws or discoveries is akin to that man. If we were to look at all the laws of science for the last one hundred years, we would find very few (mainly in thermodynamics) that have withstood the test of time. All others have been modified, if not totally altered. What we can learn from science is to be ruthlessly honest and to face up to facts. This is indeed a noble and honorable position to take. I am not suggesting an anti-scientific outlook. What I am saying is that science is limited to certain situations.

Science has a central tenet - the idea of repeatability. In other words, what we do is isolate a part of the universe (our lab), and simplify the conditions prevailing in that part of the universe (experimental conditions). We then perform our actions and observe and record our observations. This whole procedure is given the title of experiment and all of the conditions, observations and results are carefully recorded. This is then submitted to the scientific community for verification through repetition. From this we see that several conditions are necessary in order that a situation may be studied scientifically, and not all situations lend themselves to the criteria for this method: a) the conditions should be controllable, and b) the experiment should be repeatable. If these conditions cannot be met, then the event cannot be studied scientifically. Obviously not all situations lend themselves to the scientific method for study, but this does not mean that we cannot know or speak about these situations.

In addition, it should be pointed out that certain preconditions are necessary before science can even start to exist. This is very startlingly shown by looking at where the scientific method originated and flourished. In spite of the antiquity of their civilizations, neither India nor China nor Egypt nor Greece gave birth to science. A really startling example will illustrate the surprise that science did not come into being in these civilizations. The arithmetical system of numbers, with the introduction of the number zero, originated in India and this opened tremendous possibilities for calculations (just try doing a multiplication problem using Roman numerals) but, this did not lead to science. Why this is so, is answered by two different writers, both, by the way, non-Christians: A.N. Whitehead, considered England's greatest philosopher this century, and Robert Oppenheimer, one of the fathers of the American atomic bomb. Both men show that it was the European's faith in the existence of God and an orderly cosmos that encouraged an orderly study of nature which was no longer seen as capricious, but subservient to laws. So we come to the central statement that without faith, there is no knowledge and no science. There is no question and there can never be any question, of opposition between faith and knowledge. We accept even the fact of our existence which, nobody can vigorously prove.

Science is amoral, that is, it can be used for good or bad. But, how can men, who practise science, determine what is good or what is bad? This is not as easy a question as one may initially think. In Dostoyevsky's novel, The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan remarks that if there is no God then all is possible. In other words, if God does not exist, we cease to talk about right and wrong as objective values, and each simply does as he pleases. And this is exactly the point that is troubling scientists now.

There is another problem as well and this one deals with how we derive and process our knowledge. Science has no capacity to authenticate itself. Let me expand on this point. The fundamental language of science is mathematics which uses theorems and laws to function. One can go through these postulates of mathematics until we come to the basics on which everything is built. It was believed that these fundamental basics could also be proven. But, alas, in 1926, an Austrian mathematician, Godel, showed that they could not be proven. The basis of mathematics rests on statement made which cannot be proven. They are simply accepted as common sense, on the basis of faith, fundamentally. What this means is that our observations which are then submitted to logic raise a problem. How can we justify logic? Godel has proven that we can't and we are forced to simply accept certain things on faith, one of these being that the universe and its laws are subject to exploration through rational processes. In fact, one of the things that really marvelled Einstein was that the universe is even understandable.

You are probably saying to yourself, Theophilus, if there is such strong proof for belief, why don't more people believe? You must realize that faith does not involve just a simple acceptance of facts but touches the very heart of man. But the heart of man has been dirtied and cannot guide us accurately. Only those who turn to a power outside of themselves have any hope of accepting faith. There is a doctrine of the fall of man written up in the book of Genesis. Some criticize this doctrine as demeaning to humans but, I think, it holds a powerful truth which time and time again is supported by the behavior of humans. If you look at human history, you become quickly appalled at its savagery, its inhumanity. Why is this so, why doesn't it change, why don't we learn? For those who deny the doctrine of the fall of man, let them prove their case by turning to history, let them show that man is improving.

I think that a man becomes converted not just because of convincing arguments but because of factors which involve the whole of a person. It isn't simply a matter of intellect; it involves emotions, the subconscious, everything that goes towards making a person. That is why it is hard to analyze what a conversion is and to list the factors that bring it about. This is why when people seem to be coerced into a conversion, they fall out of it with the passage of time. The bottom line is that it is a gift for which we must open ourselves.

With this I end,
Yours, as always,

Bar-Abbas

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