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The apostle John spoke of Jesus when he said: "That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" (John 1:9). Down through the centuries, Jesus Christ has given Christian men of science "light" or knowledge about astronomy and the physical world, that culminated in the scientific revolution. That is shown by the prophecy of the 2,300 days in Daniel 8:13-14 which foretold the cleansing of God's sanctuary of heaven, or the universe. It was man's concept of the heavens that was "set right" at the time of the scientific revolution, 23 centuries after Daniel's vision.
In the scientific revolution, the old cosmology, which kept the ancient world in darkness and ignorance about the nature of the universe, was completely destroyed.
The development of mathematics, the exploration of the earth, and the protestant reformation all contributed to the intellectual environment in which the scientific revolution occurred.
The reformation allowed independence of thought, that was suppressed in countries dominated by the Roman Catholic Church. What is interesting in studying the developmets that led to the scientific revolution is that almost all of those involved were devout Christians, men who looked to Jesus Christ for their light, and for understanding of the natural world.
Ernest Naville showed that the great discoverers in science in past times such as Galileo, Kepler, Bacon, and Newton, were nearly always devout men. This was also true of men like Faraday, Brewster, Kelvin, and a host of others in more recent times.
The astronomical side of the scientific revolution is often supposed to have begun with Copernicus, but his ideas were not generally accepted for another two centuries. For example John Milton's poems feature a Ptolemaic universe, published in the late 17th century.
Many devout Christians, including both Catholics and Protestants, contributed to the great revolution in astronomy that eventually overthrew the old geocentric cosmology forever. This was accomplished in the mid eighteenth century, 23 centuries from the date Daniel gave for his vision of the 2,300 days.
By the mid eighteenth century Sir Isaac Newton's discoveries had become well known and popularized. His books were being translated to English and French. The period became known as the "Enlightenment".
Most of the men involved in the scientific revolution who are listed above were Christians. The scientific revolution was a movement within Christianity, and the truths that were discovered were gifts of Jesus Christ to mankind. He is the "true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" as John wrote (John 1:9). And as the sun gives light to both the evil and the just, the light of modern science that Christ has given is enjoyed by all.
Steven Dutch wrote,
The late Professor G. J. Romanes has, in his "Thoughts on Religion," left the testimony that one thing which largely influenced him in his return to faith was the fact that in his own university of Cambridge nearly all the men of most eminent scientific attainments were avowed Christians. "The curious thing," he says, "is that all the most illustrious names were ranged on the side of orthodoxy. Sir W. Manson, Sir George Stokes, Professors Tait, Adams, Clerk Maxwell, and Bayley - not to mention a number of lesser lights, such as Routte, Todhunter, Ferrers, etc., --were all avowed Christians" (page 137). ... anyone who knows the opinions of our leading scientific men is aware that to accuse the majority of being men of unchristian or unbelieving sentiment is to utter a gross libel.
This is supported by the following statement by James Orr in 1908 on the relation of Christianity to other world views.
This is perhaps the place to point out that, whatever the character of the world-view involved in Christianity, it is not one in all respects absolutely new. It rests upon, and carries forward to its completion, the richly concrete view of the world already found in the Old Testament. As an able expounder of Old Testament theology, Hermann Schultz, has justly said--"There is absolutely no New Testament view which does not approve itself as a sound and definitive formation from an Old Testament germ--no truly Old Testament view which did not inwardly press forward to its New Testament fulfilment."
This is a phenomenon which, I think, has not always received the attention it deserves. What are the main characteristics of this Old Testament conception? At its root is the idea of a holy, spiritual, self-revealing God, the free Creator of the world, and its continual Preserver. As correlative to this, and springing out of it, is the idea of man as a being made in God's image, and capable of moral relations and spiritual fellowship with his Maker; but who, through sin, has turned aside from the end of his creation, and stands in need of Redemption. In the heart of the history, we have the idea of a Divine purpose, working itself out through the calling of a special nation, for the ultimate benefit and blessing of mankind. God's providential rule extends over all creatures and events, and embraces all peoples of the earth, near and remote. In view of the sin and corruption that have overspread the world, His government is one of combined mercy and judgment; and His dealings with Israel in particular are preparative to the introduction of a better economy, in which the grace already partially exhibited will be fully revealed. The end is the establishment of a kingdom of God under the rule of the Messiah, in which all national limitations will be removed, the Spirit be poured forth, and Jehovah will become the God of the whole earth. God will make a new covenant with His people, and will write His laws by His Spirit in their hearts. Under this happy reign the final triumph of righteousness over sin will be accomplished, and death and all other evils will be abolished. Here is a very remarkable "Weltanschauung," the presence of which at all in the pages of the Hebrew Scriptures is a fact of no ordinary significance. In the comparative history of religions, it stands quite unique.
Speculations on the world and its origin are seen growing up in the schools of philosophy; but on the ground of religion there is nothing to compare with this. The lower religions, Fetishism and the like, have of course nothing of the nature of a developed world-view. The rudiments of such a view in the older nature-religions are crude, confused, polytheistic--mixed up abundantly with mythological elements. Brahmanism and Buddhism rest on a metaphysical foundation; they are as truly philosophical systems as the atomistic or pantheistic theories of the Greek schools, or the systems of Schopenhauer and Hartmann in our own day. And the philosophy they inculcate is a philosophy of despair; they contain no spring of hope or progress. Zoroastrianism, with its profound realisation of the conflict of good and evil in the universe, perhaps comes nearest to the religion of the Old Testament, yet is severed from it by an immense gulf. I refer only to its pervading dualism, its reverence for physical elements, its confusion of natural and moral evil--above all, to its total lack of the idea of historical Revelation.
The Biblical conception is separated from every other by its monotheistic basis, its unique clearness, its organic unity, its moral character, and its teleological aim.
It does not matter for the purposes of this argument what dates we assign to the books of the Old Testament in which these views are found whether we attribute them, with the critics to the age of the prophets, or to any other. These views are at least there many centuries before the Christian age began and they are found nowhere else than on the soil of Israel. This is the singular fact the critic has to face, and we cannot profess to wonder that, impartially studying it, voices should be heard from the midst of the advanced school itself unhesitatingly declaring, Date your books when you will, this religion is not explicable save on the hypothesis of Revelation!
Copyright © 2007 by Douglas E. Cox
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