8. Big Questions About the Scriptures

8.0

Intermission• The Hebrew Scriptures contain far more information than the Christian Scriptures

so, from a scriptural point of view, we are almost two-thirds of the way through the class. Considering that we will spend time on the events that had taken place between the time of the return of the Jewish people from Babylon and the time of King Herod and considering that this course has 17 sections, this is a good half-way point.

8.1

• In this section, I am going to spend some time about the skepticism concerning both the historical accuracy of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Scriptures.

• I think we can understand that, before the invention of the printing press, the only time that most believers encountered their scriptures were when they were read in public worship either by a Rabbi or a priest. I hesitate a little as I say that because I am not as knowledgeable as I should be about what level of access and knowledge Jewish believers had regarding their scriptures. I am making assumptions here that Jewish access was at the same level of Christian access and I may well be wrong in that assumption.

• In any case, Luther’s “solas” combined with the invention of the printing press made it far easier for people to have their own copies of Scripture and to form their own opinions about what Scripture meant to them. This may be a weak argument since Luther lived in the sixteenth century, but it took another three centuries for the skepticism regarding scripture to develop a serious momentum.

Skepticism Regarding the Hebrew Scriptures• Protestantism disagreed with both the Roman Catholic Church and The Eastern

Orthodox Church (and, of course, with Judaism) regarding the meaning of what scripture said. It accepted the truth of the events, however. In other words, they agreed with the facts but disagreed about the proper context in which to understand those facts.

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• The movement to question the accuracy of the Bible began slowly in the eighteenth century but gained its greatest momentum in the nineteenth century. My class on the history of Christian moral beliefs covers that process in some detail.

• The serious skepticism of the events of the Bible began in German Protestantism. The man given the most credit for starting the movement was Julius Wellhausen. We’ll discuss him shortly. For now, let me sum up some ‘facts’ which drew the skepticism.• Who were all these personages (El, Elohim, YHWH) that were called God?• Was Moses (or God through Moses) the sole author of the Torah?• Why do some of the events of the Torah seem anachronistic?• Did an Exodus really happen?• Were the Hebrew people originally henotheists who only later became

monotheists?

• We’ll examine these issues in this section. I will also touch on the skepticism that developed around the events of the Christian Scriptures though I will save their discussion until later sections. I will also challenge some of the concepts of both faith and science that we think we understand today.

Who Wrote the Torah? How Accurate is It?• As the 17th century CE began, it was almost universally accepted by both Jews

and Christians that the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) had one author and that author was Moses. It was further believed that Moses received the information for all five books of the Torah directly from God

• By the middle of the 20th century, archaeologists began to raise similar questions about other parts of the Hebrew Scriptures (and also about the Christian Scriptures as we shall see later in this course)

• By the late 19th century, Biblical scholars, led by a different group of German Protestants, began to question the notion of a single source of the Torah. They also began to question the reliability of the historical information contained in the Torah. Was it possible that the Bible contained errors?

• A century later, German Protestant scholars began a more comprehensive investigation on the authorship of the Torah

• In the mid-17th century, a French Catholic priest, Richard Simon, wrote “A Critical History of the Old Testament” questioning whether there actually was a single author of the Torah but his book failed to cause a real stir among either church leaders or members of the laity.

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Reasons for Skepticism of the Hebrew Scriptures?• Genesis has examples of doublets suggesting more than one author

- 2 creation stories; God is called Elohim in one and YHWH Elohim in the other. - two stories of Abraham passing Sarah off as his sister

(Gen. 12:10-20 and Gen. 20:1-18)

• There are anachronisms in the Torah suggesting later editors

- Deut. 34:1, Moses can see the promised land as far north as the city of Dan but there is no city called Dan until well after Moses’ death (Judges 18:28-29)

- Abraham was born in Ur of the Chaldees but there were no Chaldeans in the region for another thousand years

- In Genesis 36:31 these words are written, “These are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom before any king reigned over the Israelites.” How could anyone writing during the time of the Patriarchs or during the time of Moses write these words? How did they know Israel would have kings?

- Abraham encountered the Philistines who may not have arrived in the region until 500-600 years after Abraham’s death.

- Of course, if Moses wrote the Torah, how could he have written the details of what happened after his death?

• There are contradictions in the Torah suggesting more than one author In Genesis 15:7 God says to Abraham “I am (Ani’) YHWH that brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees” but in Exodus 6:2-3, God identified himself to Moses this way “I am (Ani’) YHWH”. YHWH then said that he revealed himself to the Patriarchs as El Shaddai did NOT reveal Himself as YHWH to any of the patriarchs.

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An Even Bigger Debate:Monotheism or Henotheism in Early Judaism?

Several modern biblical scholars (Mark S. Smith NYU, Diana Edelman, Univ. of Oslo) have raised one of the most controversial issues in Biblical studies. They claim that Judaism was not originally a monotheistic religion but rather a henotheistic faith

Or this, the Shema

“Hear, O Israel, The Lord (YHWH) our God (eloheinu) is one and you shall love the Lord (YHWH) your god (eloheika) with your whole heart” etc.

Once this possibility was raised, a number of passages of scripture could be looked on in a different light. For example, is YHWH simply one of the Elohim (Council of Gods)?

“I am the Lord your God (YHWH) who brought you out of the land of Egypt. ….You shall have no other gods (elohim) before me” (Ex. 20:2-3)

Henotheism is defined as a situation where multiple deities exist, but each deity is assigned to a specific tribe or group. So, while multiple ‘gods’ exist, each group of peoples is assigned to worship and follow the one ‘god’ assigned to that group

Their theory regarding the Hebrews goes something like this. El, like Zeus, is the Father god of a council of gods (elohim). This was not unlike the belief of the Canaanite people. El assigned a specific god in the council to individual tribes. YHWH was assigned to the Hebrews who later became Israel

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What Passages of Scripture Hint at Henotheism?• We have seen that many different terms in the Torah are translated as “God” (El,

Elohim, El Elyon [El Most High], El Shaddai [El Almighty], YHWH) and “Lord” (Adonai which some consider a variant spelling of the Egyptian God Aten) yet;

This same passage in the Dead Sea Scrolls uses “children of Elohim” instead of “children of men” and that change can give the passage and entirely different meaning

• In any case, there is a passage from Deuteronomy (32:8-9) that uses a name for God found in Genesis (Elyon) that has caused some controversy

“When the Most High (Elyon) gave the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of men, he set the borders of the peoples according to the numbers of the sons (children) of Israel. For the portion of YHWH is His people, Jacob, the lot of his inheritance.”

- Elohim is a plural form of Eloah (a variation of El) but keep in mind that it is also true that, in the Hebrew Scriptures, when Elohim is used to refer to the Hebrew God, it usually has a grammatical context that indicates a singular meaning of the word. Some scholars, though, have speculated that this plural form Elohim may a collective term meaning the “Council of El” or the “family of El” or even “the pantheon of El”

- El, one of the Hebrew names for God, was both a common name for God and also the name of the creator God in the Canaanite religion.

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The Masoretic Text (9th-10th century CE? ) of the Hebrew Bible uses the standard text for passage for Deut. 32:8-9. It reads;

םימע ת>בג בצי;םדא ינב ודירפהב,םיוג ןוילע לחנהב.לארשי ינב רפסמל

.ותלחנ לבח ,בקעי:ומע ,הוהי קלח יכ“When the Most High (Elyon) gave the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of Adam, he set the borders of the peoples according to the numbers of the children of Israel. For the portion of YHWH is His people, Jacob, the lot of his inheritance.”

The Dead Sea Scroll fragment of Deut. 32:8-9 does not have םדא ינב;but rather םיהולא ינב . Consider just how much this changes the passage

A Closer Look at Deuteronomy 32 8:9

“When the Most High (Elyon) gave the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of Elohim, he set the borders of the peoples according to the numbers of the children of Israel. For the portion of YHWH is His people, Jacob, the lot of his inheritance.”The first passage seems to describe how God set aside the Promised Land for Israel. The second passage, these scholars claim, seems to describe how El assigned each nation a specific deity that belonged to the Elohim. Each nation was then to worship and adore its own deity but never the deity of another nation. This is the definition of henotheism.

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See, where he stands, the Ruler (Elyon) of all, among the rulers (Elohim) assembled, comes forward to pronounce judgement on the rulers themselves! “Will you never cease perverting justice, espousing the cause of the wicked? Come, give redress to the poor and the friendless, do right to the afflicted and the destitute; to you, need and poverty look for deliverance, rescue them from the hand of wickedness. But no, ignorant and unperceiving, they grope their way in darkness; see how unstable are the props of earth! Gods (Elohim) you are, I myself have declared it; favored children(B’nai), every one of you, of the most High (Elyon) yet the doom of mortals (k’Adam)awaits you, you shall fall with the fall of human princes”. Arise, Elohim, bring the world to judgement; all the nations are your inheritance.

And Then There Is Psalm 82

A more traditional explanation of the text states that it was a view of Judaism at the time of the Psalmist that pagan gods were seen as false entities and had no power compared to the God of Israel. The God of Israel allowed the nations (goyim) to worship these false gods, but not Israel. He had chosen Israel as his own. These false gods will lose their status as gods for failing to care for their peoples whom God created. This was part of the disorder (ra) that appeared after the fall, where God had created order (tov). Another alternative is that this could simply be a description of the fall of Satan and his minions

For those who support the Henotheist theory, this passage, proclaimed by the Psalmist, seems to say that Elyon (El Elyon, God Most High?) is the chief God who appointed other gods (Elohim) to rule over men but because they have ruled unjustly they shall no longer be children of Elyon but shall die like children of Adam?

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In Contrast, Consider The Famous Passage from ExodusThere is a principle in Christianity that Scripture best interprets Scripture. A profound passage in the Hebrew Scriptures may provide an insight into all of this. In Exodus 3, Moses confronts God in the burning bush. God tells Moses that he is to go the Pharaoh and tell Pharaoh to set God’s chosen people free. Moses than asks God what name should he give to Pharaoh, and to the Israelites, when they ask in whose name Moses is doing all of this. God tells Moses his name,

היהא רשא היהאAnd then says that Moses should tell that Children of Israel that he was sent to them by, היהא

I am who I am (or I will be who I will be)

I am

There are groups of biblical scholars who suspect that the Book of Deuteronomy was added to the other books of the Torah at the time of Josiah. I am unaware, though, of any scholar who does not agree that the Book of Exodus was an original book of the Torah. No scholar doubts that the Book of Psalms was written much later. Yet, here, in language so plain and so profound, in this book, YHWH is identifying himself as the one who not only exists but is existence itself. He is and so all other things could come to be.

If the Book of Exodus is foundational, then the Book of Psalms needs to be understood in light of the books that came before it. A more current approach to scriptural interpretation, however, doesn’t support the Christian principle that Scripture best interprets Scripture. It sees the Hebrew Scriptures not as work that has any inherent internal unity but rather a collection of works combined and loosely edited perhaps during the Babylonian captivity. The editor ( the redactor in today’s language) provided what little unity can be found in Scripture so the Christian principle is not valid.

8.9

Who Is Credited With the Beginning of Modern Skepticism about the Bible?

Julius Wellhausen was a Protestant pastor who worked primarily at the University of Gottingen from the end of the 19th century through the early 20th century. He was, perhaps, the most famous of the biblical scholars of his era. Wellhausen is the most well-known proponent of the notion that the Hebrew Scriptures are a loosely edited collection of stories of one or more peoples who ultimately formed the Kingdom of Israel

In the next slides, we’ll give a brief overview of the Wellhausen’s ideas about the contributions that each source made to the Torah

Wellhausen identified his fours sources as; the Jahwist source (J), the Elohist source (E), the Deuteronomic source (D) and the Priestly source (P). His theory was called the Documentary Hypothesis

Wellhausen’s work opened the door to all sorts of insights into the Hebrew Scriptures along with new insights into the understanding of the Christian Scriptures

Wellhausen focused on the Torah and he believed that he could identify four separate sources for the Hebrew writings that became known as the Torah. (Each source will be discussed in slides that follow)

Julius Wellhausen

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What is “J”, the Jahwist Source?The J (Jahwist) Source

The Jahwist author seems to prefer to the call the mountain on which Moses encountered God by the name Sinai.

The Jahwist author was thought by Wellhausen to have been from the southern kingdom of Judah and lived sometime around 900 BCE because he seems concerned largely with areas of the promised land located in that kingdom. His description of the kingdom promised by JHWH to Abraham also corresponds most to the united kingdom at the time of David and Solomon, whose capital city was in the Southern Kingdom

• walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden “in the cool of the day”. * • created Eve from Adam’s rib. • molded Adam from the dust of the earth.

The J source derives from the German spelling of the name Hebrew name for God הוהי(YHWH in English but JHWH in German where the letter J is sounded as a Y, Yah?) In J, God is earthly, almost humanized. He interacts directly with his human creations. In Chapter 2 of Genesis, J,

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* Keep in mind that in Genesis 2, God is called YHWH Elohim often translated as “the Lord God”, not simply as YHWH as he is in other parts of the Torah. This led some henotheist theorists to read this as “YWHW (one of) the Elohim”.

The E (Elohist) Source

In the E source, God is called Elohim* (Gen. 1). Elohim is the opposite of JHWH. He is majestic and transcendent.

What is “E”, the Elohist Source?

• Reminder: Elohim is a plural noun however when Elohim is used to refer to the God of the Hebrews, the verb is always 3rd person singular. When the word is used to refer to foreign gods, the verb is always 3rd person plural. Despite that fact, “interpreters” have made of a lot of assumptions about what Elohim means in various passages of Scripture.

For the Elohist, the mountain of God was called Horeb and not Sinai

As we have already seen, the word El and Elohim were common words for God among the Canaanites many of whom who lived in the regions where the Northern Kingdom of Israel had been established after the death of Solomon. The Elohist author’s use of these words for God and his interest in the important cities in the north led Wellhausen to believe that the Elohist lived in the Northern Kingdom sometime around 850 BCE

While J interacted directly with human beings, E interacted with them via messengers or angels

While J created ha adam (man) from the adamah (red earth), E created the universe by simply speaking it into existence. Adam and Eve were the pinnacle of that creation.

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The D (Deuteronomist) Source

While the J and E sources are found mostly in Genesis, the Deuteronomist source in the Torah is almost exclusively limited to the Book of Deuteronomy (and the historical books of the Ketuvim; Joshua, Judges, 1+2 Samuel, 1+2 Kings sometimes called the Deuteronomic History)

What is “D”, the Deuteronomist Source?

Another theory holds that the discovery was a genuine find. One version of this theory speculates that refugees from the destruction of the Northern Kingdom (Israel) fled to the Southern Kingdom (Judah) and brought the scroll with them. The scroll was then deposited in the Temple and forgotten until it was rediscovered by Hilkiah some decades later. This theory holds that the find was genuine because, while the scroll did mention the need for centralized worship, it did not specify the Temple of Jerusalem. Perhaps this is because Northern Kingdom also had a central location of sacrificial worship at Mount Gerizim

These scholars believe this because the scroll emphasized the need for many of the reforms put in place by King Josiah (e.g. recommitment of the people to the worship of one God, centralization of worship) Given that this “discovery” fit so well with Josiah’s reform, it may well not have been found but written either by Josiah and Hilkiah themselves or by a scribe under their direction

Many modern biblical scholars believe that the scroll of the law that Hilkiah found while the Temple in Jerusalem was being refurbished during the reign of Josiah (2 Kings 22:8) was actually the book of Deuteronomy (the second law) and not a copy of the entire Torah

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The P (Priestly) Source

Before the time of the Babylonian captivity, the position of King in the history of the people of Judah had been well established for several centuries. The role of the High Priest (ha-Kohen ha-Gadol) also seemed well established.

What is “P”, the Priestly Source?

These scholars also suggest that the biggest impact of P can be found in the Book of Leviticus and the non-narrative sections of the Book of Numbers. Since P deals largely with themes of cult and ritual, Wellhausen, being a Protestant scholar and having no love for ritual or priesthood, believed that cult and ritual were always a later, corrupted form of religious experience. For this reason, he believed that P was the most recent source to be added to the Torah and speculated that P might have been the final editor of the Torah.

These scholars suggest that passages such as Ex. 29, Ex. 40:15 and Lev. 8 and 9 that do stress the High Priest were inserted later by P to provide an historic basis for the increasing importance of Jewish cultic worship in the Temple and the role of the High Priest among the people after the Babylonian captivity in the absence of a true King.

Some critics, however, note that there are some passages in the Torah do not seem to show the reverence that one would expect to be given to the ha-Kohen ha-Gadol. For example, Aaron was simply called ha-Kohen (the priest) as was Eleazer, Aaron’s successor. They added that, during the reign of King David, there were two men in Jerusalem who were simultaneously called ha-Kohen, Abiathar and Zadok (2 Sam 8:17 and 19:12 along with 1Kings 1:7 and 4:4)

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The basic viewpoints of much of the biblical criticism that came from Wellhausen and those who came after him seem to follow some variations on this theme:

Summing Up

What do you believe were the most important words of the propositions which were just mentioned?

• The Torah was probably edited (redacted) a number of times by different editors (redactors) and did not reach its current form until the time of the Babylonian Captivity. This would explain many of the anachronisms found in the Torah.

• The Exodus never happened at least not as described in the Torah

• The twelve tribes of Israel may represent the main groups of peoples that finally united to form a common political union. Perhaps the three patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) were patriarchs of three of the more important groups that were later made part of a common lineage

• The Torah is an attempt to present the many and varied histories of different peoples as a common history of a single people

• The people that inhabited the land that was known as Israel during the time of Saul, David and Solomon probably did not all migrate to that land out of Egypt during the time of Moses

If you ID’ed the words ‘may’, ‘might’ and ‘probably’, you have the best grasp on biblical criticism. It uses facts but then speculates on the best context to understand them

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Does Archaeology Have Anything to Add?Scriptural scholars were not alone in their criticism of the historical reliability of the Hebrew Scriptures. Archaeologists also weighed in. In their work, “The Quest for the Historical Israel: Debating Archaeology and the History of Early Israel” authors Israel Finkelstein (Prof. of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University) and Amihai Mazar (Prof. at the Inst. of Archaeology at Hebrew University of Jerusalem) describe how archaeologists seem to be divided concerning the history of Israel as found in the Hebrew Scriptures:

Centrist The early history of Israel found in the Hebrew Scriptures represents a view of late monarchic Judah (Josiah). There are real facts and real characters to be found in this history but the context of this history represents a viewpoint of the 6th century BCE read back into the 12th through the 7th century BCE

Minimalist The Hebrew Scriptures were likely compiled sometime during the Persian era (@ 450 BCE) or during the Hellenist era (@300 BCE) that followed it. The early history of Israel is nothing more than a collection of folk stories tied together by one or more editors and is of little historic value

Conservative Though the early history of Israel as found in the Hebrew Bible was not likely compiled until the time between Josiah and the Babylonian Captivity, the information found therein about the early history of Israel is fairly accurate

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But Doesn’t Archaeology Confirm Scripture?Yes! Archaeology may question parts of the Hebrew Scriptures, but it quite often confirms much of what those scriptures contain

These are facts. It is also a fact that many long-held beliefs by archaeologists have proven to be way off base. The recent finds at Gobekli Tepe in Turkey and Tel Qaramel in Syria show evidence of significant culture dating back to around 10,000 BCE. For years. archaeology held that civilization in the region began with Sumer around 4,000 BCE

• Evidence has recently turned up verifying a Northern Kingdom (House of Omri) and Southern Kingdom (House of David).

• There was an upset of the internal order of the land of Canaan about the time of Joshua

• These Pharaohs did use forced labor to build the cities of Pi-Rameses and Pithom (Pi-Thom) mentioned in the Torah

• Pharaohs of Egyptian origin who “did not know Joseph” did manage to regain control of Egypt from the Hyksos kings

• There were Pharaohs of Egypt (the Hyksos Kings) thought to be of Semitic origin at the time of Joseph

• Canaanite peoples did migrate to Northeastern Egypt at the time of Abraham

• Semi-nomadic tribes called ha-bi-ru by the Akkadians and a-pi-ru by the Egyptians did wander the Fertile Crescent at the time of Abraham

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Another Way of Looking at the Centrist ViewSince the JEDP hypothesis was first proposed, there have been any number of variations on that theme among scholars and critics, both biblical and archaeological. One thing should be kept in mind about all of these theories. They are theories.

You get the idea. When the Torah reached its final written state, it referenced people and places as they would be recognized by the readers of that time period not as they were at the time of the actual events

The city of Dan had not yet been established during the time of Moses, but it had been long established by the time of the Babylonian exile

There were no Philistines in Canaan at the time of Abraham but there were during the time of the Babylonian exile

There were no Chaldeans in Ur at the time of Abraham but there were during the time of the Babylonian exile

Consider another theory. Let’s assume that some critics are correct. Moses was not the final author of the Torah. The Torah was edited in its final written form during the Babylonian exile

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Biblical Criticism in the Christian Scriptures (I)The Hebrew Scriptures were not alone in the re-examination of its texts. The Christian Scriptures also came under scrutiny in the nineteenth century. The origin of their critiques also had Germany as its source. In 1836, David Friedrich Strauss of Ludwigsburg produced Das Leben Jesu Kritisch Arbeitet. It was published in English ten years later as The Life of Jesus Critically Examined. In 1854, Ludwig Feuerbach added his work The Essence of Christianity. Interestingly, both Strauss and Feuerbach claimed to be influenced by the works of Hegel. In 1860, seven liberal Anglican theologians added their bit in a work called Essays and Reviews. Their work was so controversial that it managed to take Christianity’s mind away from a work by another Englishman named Darwin for almost five years.

From two principles the Modernists deduce two laws, which, when united with a third (which they have already taken from agnosticism), constitute the foundation of historical criticism. We will take an illustration from the Person of Christ. In the person of Christ, they say, science and history encounter nothing that is not human. Therefore, ….(the first law) whatever there is in His history suggestive of the divine, must be rejected. Then, according to the second law, the historical Person of Christ was transfigured by faith; therefore everything that raises it above historical conditions must be removed. Lastly, the third law, which lays down that the person of Christ has been disfigured by faith, requires that everything should be excluded, deeds and words and all else that is not in keeping with the character, circumstances and education, and with the place and time in which He lived. A strange style of reasoning, truly; but it is Modernist criticism…. Now we ask here: Who is the author of this history? The historian? The critic? …From beginning to end everything in it is that there is nothing special about the person of Jesus because, a priori, they have decided that there cannot be.

A number of comments on historical criticism of the Bible noted that there was a certain a priori aspect to it. For example, Albert Schweitzer noted that critics trying to discover the “real Jesus” often found exactly what they thought they would find. Perhaps Pope Pius X explained it best in his encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907)

Biblical Criticism in the Christian Scriptures (II)Pope Pius X was not alone in his reaction to the historical criticism of Scripture.

In 1833, a movement of traditional Anglican Protestants in Oxford began to challenge the Latitudinarians who seemed more comfortable with the trends toward liberalizing the understanding of Jesus in the English Church. They began to publish tracts in support of their positions. As a result, they became known as Tractarians, but they were more often know as The Oxford Movement.

The Tractarians wanted the Church of England to think of itself in terms that might be more in line with a Church of Eastern Orthodoxy. The Church of England was an autocephalous (self-ruling) church that was, like the Churches of the East, faithful to all of the seven great Councils and to all the teachings of the Church Fathers.

While they recognized the Bishop of Rome as important, they did not consider him to have authority over them in any way. When two of the leaders of the Oxford Movement, John Henry Newman and Henry Edward Manning converted to Catholicism, the movement lost some of it steam. Nevertheless, the movement continued and remains as the Anglo-Catholic part of the Church of England today.

Biblical Criticism in the Christian Scriptures (III)In the United States, a movement of conservative Presbyterians from the Princeton Theological Seminary th took place in the late Nineteenth century also reacted to the modernist understanding of the Bible in general and of Jesus in particular. As the movement grew, it attracted Baptists and other traditional Protestant denominations.

As the movement developed, they rallied around five tenets of Christianity that they insisted were fundamental to any denomination that would consider itself Christian. These five fundamentals were;

1. The belief that the Bible was the inspired word of God and was, therefore, infallible

2. The belief that Jesus was born of a Virgin

3. The belief that Jesus death was an atonement for sin

4. The belief that Jesus rose bodily from the dead

5. The belief that Jesus’ miracles were historically real and true

How Well Do Believers Understand What They Believe?

Many of us have heard complaints about God that began with the words, “If God knew ahead of time…”. Such complaints often sound reasonable to the human ear. But consider this thought. Time and space, science tells us, are inextricably linked. Temporal words and expressions such as before, during and after have meaning for us as humans but what meaning do they have for the God who simply is? Might not everything be present before God in an ever-present now?

How can human beings begin to imagine what an eternity that is an ever-present now might be like? I have to admit, though, that it sounds like a more interesting kind of eternity than a series of days that never end.

What is the true nature of the God found in the Bible? There is one thing that the Bible makes very clear. God is. In fact, he tells Moses to tell the Israelites that his name is ‘I Am’. There is an elegance in that simple response. What it says is straightforward. What it implies, we can only begin to understand.

When we speak of what God is like, what his nature is, we often use words like transcendent, immanent, omniscient and so many others. I spent 25 years of my life working in the world of data communication, mostly supporting products being tested at AT&T Labs. I listened to a lot of presentations. Whenever I would hear a lot of technical jargon, and multisyllabic words used, I often found that the jargon was used because the presenter didn’t really understand what the terms meant. I think that can be true in many situations. Talking about God is simply just another example.

What does it mean that God is omniscient, transcendent, immanent, eternal? Could it mean that all of creation, all of time and space, is ever-present before God. Perhaps that is the context in which to understand those terms. God is omniscient because everything is before him now. He is transcendent because he stands apart from it, immanent because he is always aware of it and sometimes interacts with it. And then there’s eternal.

How Do Believers Think About Their Relationship With God?The Bible tells us that we humans are made in God’s image and likeness. Skeptics, of course, are quick to say that it’s really the other way around. But what do we understand about what being made in the image and likeness of God means? In my Christian Morality class, I quoted (and even played a recording of) a Christian TV preacher named Kenneth Copeland. Rev. Copeland looked at Isaiah 40:12 which said that God marked the heavens with the span of his hand. Since an average span is reckoned to be about 9 inches, Rev. Copeland believed God to be about 6’ 2” weighing in at about 220 pounds.I suspect that Rev. Copeland has missed the point but then what does that expression “in the image and likeness of God mean”? You can get a lot of different answers on that one, but I’ll suggest one way of understanding it. It means we have an intellect, a mind that can be used to explore what God says in Scripture. It means that we also have a will, a heart that was meant to choose to accept what Scripture says about God or reject it. It means that God gave human beings the capacity to learn and to not only love but love selflessly. That is what being made in the image and likeness of God might mean. I find it in the Shema of the Hebrew Scriptures as well as in the Sermon on the Mount in the Christian Scriptures.So, we are like God in some ways but not like God in other ways. Isaiah 55:8 makes this clear. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways”, says the LORD. That truth is made very clear in one of the greatest books in Scripture, the book of Job. In Chapter 38 of that book, God explains in no uncertain terms how he is different than us. Yet, there is in this dialogue with Job as well as in Abraham’s bargaining with God over the fate of Sodom, a sense of the dignity afforded not simply by humans to God which is to be expected but by God to his human creatures. There is always also that sense of love. Perhaps these passages do not define the relationship, but they may serve as examples of it. I find that same thing in the Sermon on the Mount, more of a sample of what Christian love should look than a command to behave in a certain way.

Science vs Scientism - ScienceScience has advanced a great deal since the Renaissance to the point where we may have moved from beyond the age of science to an age of scientism. Here is an example. One of the great inventions of science is the scientific method. When properly used, this method provides a self-correcting principle that is extremely useful as we humans try to better understand the universe in which we live.

The scientific method usually is understood in this way. Someone(s) has a theory. They state that theory and make predictions based on it. They then provide a series of experiments to test the theory to see if the predicted outcomes are achieved. If their tests are successful, they publish their work for peer review. Other scientists read the published work, perform the tests for themselves and, if they have the same success, they either accept the theory as true or they could offer alternative reasons for the predicted results. One thing science demands is repeatability.

Let’s look at Darwin’s theory. First, let’s make this clear. Darwin did not claim that men descended from apes. He did claim that humans and apes had a common ancestor. He proposed that multiple small mutations over time gradually accumulated resulting in a significant mutation. As various life forms competed with each other for food and for reproduction, those creatures that had mutations favorable to their environment thrived while those that did not, died out. Darwin was challenged. Science could demonstrate the small mutations within a species but had too few examples in the fossil record of the predicted trans-species evolution. Darwin then made a prediction. He said that, over time, greater numbers of such fossils would be found. So far, they have not.

One could ask if Darwinism is real science. As a theory, it is. It explains a lot and, to date, no one has come up with a theory that explains more. One could argue over catastrophism over the gradualism of his theory, but his theory remains the best to date.

Science vs Scientism - ScientismScientism is something that seems scientific on the surface but really is not. I’ll use a variation of Darwin’s theory to provide an example. We are all aware of the notion of Manifest Destiny. We all understand that slavery was accepted by many Christians for many years. Some of that can be laid at the feet of scientism, specifically, Social Darwinism.

Manifest Destiny was the idea that Americans were destined to rule a land from the Atlantic to the Pacific. How did they justify the killing of those people that got in their way. Easy. Social Darwinism. Americans believed that, being more evolved culturally and intellectually than Native Americans and more evolved politically than the French and Spanish assured them that they were both destined and justified by competing, as all living things compete, for food and reproduction. Sadly, that same line of thinking was used, along with a few select bible verses, to justify slavery.

Many people of the nineteenth century believed this. Interestingly, it was Judeo-Christianity’s philosophy of care for the less fortunate that changed many people’s minds. Scientism had broken the bounds of true science and faith rose up to defend its own truths.

Oddly enough, scientism could be found in the ideas on Marx and Lenin. Both believed that Communism was the scientific approach to government and that people of faith had to be ‘re-educated’ to see the truth. Yet every advance that these “men of science” predicted failed to result with one exception. There was greater equality. Everyone was equally poor (except the leaders of course as Orwell reminded us in Animal Farm). In fact, in less than a century, the scientism of Communism caused an estimated 70-90 million deaths. That is more deaths in one century chalked up to scientism than all the deaths in religious wars since the time of Christ.

The Enlightenment perhaps freed human reason from the restraints that faith, or at least men of faith, placed upon it. Yet as the Nineteenth century turned to the Twentieth and the “reasonable and scientific” ideas of men like Hegel and Marx became popular, in a fit of hubris, some began to think that science had all of the answers. Yet there were also men of reason who understood the limits that science and reason would have to face

Reasonable people of science realize that the scientific method allows for no such thing as settled science. Though there may be limits to knowledge, science is always seeking to push those limits as far as possible

Kurt Schrödinger proposed a cat who is both living and dead at the same time. Probabilities only collapse into actualities upon observation.

Werner Heisenberg has given us his Principle of Uncertainty which says that, in the sub-atomic world of small things (the Microcosm), we can only speak about truths in degrees of probability. Newtonian physics only worked in the world of larger things.

The twentieth century mathematician, Kurt Gödel, put forth his Theory of Incompleteness which stated that no method of describing a system that had even the smallest level of complexity, could do so without ultimately being self-referential (i.e. relying on a set of unproven universal “givens”)

Bertrand Russell, a famous twentieth century philosopher and ardent atheist, demonstrated a humility derived from honest self-reflection, which should be common to all honest men of reason. In his work, The Problems of Philosophy, he stated that any system that requires an unproven (and unprovable) set of universal “givens” can never produce a set of universally reliable truths

Science Admits Its Own Limits

A Tale (somewhat mangled) with a MoralA local photographer had bragged that he could capture any scene with his camera that even the best artist in the land could not capture on canvas. Hearing the man brag, a second man, known for his artistic skills, challenged the photographer to prove his point

Moral: A reasonable person should never forget that, in this world, the observer is always an integral part of the process of observation. Only God, who stands apart from his creation, sees and understands the entire length, width and breadth of what he set in place

At that point, the artist objected and asked this question. “Did we not agree that the winner of the contest would be the one who most accurately portrayed the beach scene”? The judges agreed that was the goal. The artist then asked the judges, was the photographer not standing on the beach? Where is he in his photograph?” The artist had included the photographer in his painting of the beach scene. The judges agreed and the artist was awarded the prize.

When the judges saw the photo, they were impressed by both the beauty and the accuracy of the scene in the photo. The artist then presented his work to the judges. The work was a masterpiece of art, but the judges decided in favor of the photographer.

The photographer set about his work. He took his camera and tripod and walked out onto the beach. At the appointed time, he set up his equipment and took his photograph. When he was finished, the photographer was certain that his work would surely meet, if not exceed, even the best painting that the artist could produce. The artist set up his easel few feet back away from the beach and began his work.

A certain area of beach and a certain date and time of day was chosen. The artist challenged the photographer to capture the beach scene exactly as it was on that date and at that time. The artist would make his own painting and, judges would decide which work most accurately portrayed the beach scene

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Speaking of the Importance of LookingI believe that there will always be limits that the universe will impose that will prevent science from ever fully and completely describing the universe. Every scientist who makes attempts to observe creation must understand that he or she is part of the system that is being observed. There will never be a complete and unbiased observation of creation unless the observer stands outside the system being observed. That’s just another way of saying that the only true uninvolved observer of events that occur in the three dimensions of space and the one dimension of time must be someone who transcends both space and time.

There is a sense of beauty and magic to science much as there is to God. Real science is humble in the face of this and real scientists, at least the ones that appeal to me, reflect that humility. Here is a brief video that explains some of the beauty of the scientific method with an honest evaluation of its limits. It also does so with a little bit of humor.

On the other hand, science impresses me because, despite these limitations, it continues to look ever more deeply into creation to try to understand as much of its truths as possible. The scientific method also impresses me because, when it is fully applied, it offers a mechanism for ongoing self-correction, the scientific method.

It’s a MysteryReligion may have its mysteries…But so does science

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9tKncAdlHQ is the link for those seeing this via .pdf files.

What Does This All Mean?The Schrödinger’s cat analogy tries to explain the results of the double-slit experiment. When we are not observing, the cat is in a state of probability, 50% chance of being dead and 50% chance of being alive. That is exemplified by the wave outcome as the atoms or photons pass unobserved. When the observer looks to see that fate of the cat, the probability collapses into a 100% certainty. The cat is either alive or dead. That is represented by the particle outcome of the test.

What to make of all this? Consider the question of a tree falling in a forest. If there’s no one there to hear it, does it make a sound? Actually, Aristotle provides a great answer. The falling tree produces vibrations in the air which are the potential for sound. Those potentials are never realized unless there is also an ear to hear the vibrations.

What the dual-slit experiment seems to me to be saying is that photons or atoms that are not observed are probability waves. They have the potential to become particles if they are observed. They are the equivalent of the sound waves in the tree/forest question. If they remain unobserved, they remain probability waves. Weird, huh?

This also solves a theological problem regarding free will. If God looks at all creation as an ever-present now, how can there be such a thing as free-will. Well, if we look at God’s creation, not in terms a creation of things but rather as a creation of probability waves that collapse into things only when observed, then free will is restored. There is sort of an example of this in science. Science tells us that there is something that exists called a Higgs field. It seems to be a field of energy that has no mass. When a certain type of boson (a particle with no mass) interacts with it, mass results. That particle is called the Higgs Boson or “the God particle”. OK. Got all that? Good, let’s move on.

A Faith That Is Not UnreasonableI believe that an integrated human being can and should use both his intellect and his will to investigate truth. Reason and faith are best when they work together in the pursuit of truth. While revealed truth may not be discoverable by reason, it should never be completely unreasonable. A short video and the slide that follows will attempt to make that point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wv0vxVRGMY is the link if you are viewing this as a .pdf file.

Miraculous But Not UnreasonableKeeping the lessons of Flatland in mind, consider this cylinder. As this three-dimensional shape intersects the two-dimensional plane, it appears to those existing on the plane to be an ordinary circle, fully recognized and accepted as a valid citizen of Flatland.

From a two-dimensional perspective, the cylinder is fully circle. But from a three-dimensional perspective, it is fully cylinder and can have amazing powers, when interacting with a two-dimensional world. I could easily make the analogy with Jesus as fully human and fully divine.

The cylinder if free to move around in three dimensions which includes the direction of ‘up’, a dimension of which two-dimensional beings have no concept. Th three-dimensional being could easily appear and disappear in a two-dimensional world.

Just as the apple could say “hello” out of nowhere could not have God talked to Moses from a burning bush or from a cloud to Jesus at his baptism?

Faith and ReasonHuman beings have both an intellect that allows them to distinguish between truth and falsehood and a will sufficiently free to seek the truth wherever it might be found and to avoid that which is false.

Science seeks truth through investigation. The scientific method is designed to provide a means by which that investigation follows a set of rules and, when the rules are followed, the results of the investigation and the conclusions drawn from those results can be tested and verified.

Faith seeks truth as well, but the truths sought by faith extend beyond the physical world and into the realm of metaphysics. People of faith also must investigate those truths, but the scientific method isn’t very useful in the world of metaphysics. Faith tends to rely on revelation rather than discovery. I think Augustine of Hippo provided the best method of discovering truth in the world of metaphysics. In the fifth century CE, he wrote, Credo ut intelligam. I believe so that I might understand. Belief doesn’t end the process of discovery. It is the beginning of it.

In the world of the macrocosm, it may well seem that we encounter Faith vs. Reason. When we get into the microcosm, I have found, that Reason has shown me a world that is as mysterious as any divine revelation. Faith offers me a chance to use science to better understand revelation as found in Scripture and in Creation.

The Golden Age of many faiths occurs when the people of faith are not afraid to use reason to discover some aspects of God within his creation. Avicenna did that for Islam. Maimonides did that for Judaism. Aquinas did that for Christianity.

Be Not AfraidTruth is truth. If reason proves beyond any doubt that a point of faith in not true, then faith must either explain the issue or renounce its belief. Consider the situation with Galileo.

Side note: Galileo was not initially prohibited from teaching heliocentrism as a theory. He was prohibited from teaching it as truth. There were matters of faith involved but there was also a matter of science. A number of scholars complained that if the earth moved around the sun, there would be a parallax effect on the way that stars would appear (closer and brighter at times when the earth was on the side of the sun closer to what they called the ‘fixed stars’ and farther away and dimmer when the earth was on the other side of the sun.) yet no difference was detected, Galileo could not explain the absence of the effect. That changed when the quality of telescopes improved, and the predicted differences became obvious to all.

Truth is truth. If faith presents a situation, such as a miracle, that science cannot explain, then science must admit that something beyond its current understanding, something literally metaphysical has taken place. Consider the many miracles attributed to Saints that have withstood all scientific investigation.

Both faith and reason should follow the advice of 1 Peter 3:15;

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that lies within you. But do so with gentleness and respect.

Seekers of truth should always show a certain humility in their efforts. Humor also goes a long way. This advice works for men of science and any religious leader who ever had to give a sermon or a homily, and maybe, too, for certain teachers at Osher, present company most especially included.

My Favorite Quote

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS ABSOLUTE TRUTH!

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A few years ago, I took a fascinating Summer class at Osher about certitude versus probability. The teacher suggested that while there are some things about which we can be certain (e.g. that in base 5 and above, 2+2 will always equal 4), there are also things we believe to be certain but actually are only highly probable.

When someone in the class asked if he really believed that, he replied “absolutely!”. The class broke out in laughter. The poor retired professor looked flummoxed and clearly didn’t get it.

It was a very innocent and accurate statement but there was a retired Professor who would have none of it. Like Moses’ coming down from the mountain (not the Mel Brooks version), he stated in a loud, even stentorian voice,

People of faith can be closed-minded but so can people of science. How many professors who were deemed experts in their field cling to their positions long after they had been proven wrong. Ego is, after all, only human.

What Is the Best Approach to Hard Parts of the Bible?Facts are facts. Be as certain as possible that what is stated as a fact is provable but never be afraid of facts. Facts are your best friends as you pursue truth whether through faith or through reason. Context, on the other hand, is an attempt to gather together a set of facts to find truth. While facts are, or ought to be, objective in nature, context is far more subjective. You can and should be like the Bereans and test the context to make sure that it, indeed, leads to truth.

Scripture, both the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Scriptures, tell a story of faith. It takes place in the context of human history but is not meant to be taken as simply history. It tells a greater story. It deals with greater truths

Faith attempts to deal with truths which transcend the boundaries of reason alone. At the same time, the revelations that lead to faith must keep in mind that its message is meant for human beings who have reason. I have tried to explain that there is a difference between believing in God and believing in a flying spaghetti monster

In any context that attempts to explain truth, words like “probably” or “most likely” are always cause for a careful attitude of honest skepticism

Systems that attempt to explain all facts in a type of universal setting are inherently unreliable since the observer never really can never truly stand off the beach to explain the totality of creation. These systems are, as Bertrand Russell noted, useful for verifying the reasonableness of the logic employed by the system. When unreasonableness is found the scientific method should allow for it to be corrected

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