Thesis on "Relationship Between Science and Christianity"

Thesis 12 pages (4044 words) Sources: 15 Style: Turabian

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Science and Christianity

Introduction common factor linking science and Christians in the debate about the existence of God, a hereafter - which is the Promise of God - and the history of Christians contained in the Bible is evidence. Both sides ask: is there evidence that science is wrong about evolution, creation, and that the Bible is right. Science, the professionals agree, and the Christians point out, is built upon models of "what if," in many cases. Most of the what if models were built around those questions that, if solved, and when solved, do more to link science and faith than to divide them in a decided way. For all the posturing about the accuracy of math and numbers being the only reliable evidence about anything in the universe, the revealing discoveries about ourselves as humans from a science approach, has often been proved wrong. The bold statement of scientists early in the argument, wherein they perhaps smiled mischievously and said, "Prove it," is no longer said with the smile or the conviction with which the two words were once uttered across the debate table to the Christians. For many of the events described in the Bible, which are significant events in the lives of Christians, science has proven did occur, or demonstrated how those events, including the parting of the Red Sea, could have occurred. Recent hypothesis and archeological ruins uncovered in recent decades, link science and faith in an almost inextricable way.

This paper is going to examine the connection between science and Christianity. Regardless of the position one wishes to take, be it science or faith, the examination of the hypotheses and evidence is intriguing and interesting.

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Science and Christian Theories

Four thousands years ago, in the land of Canan, monotheism emerged as the Jewish tradition. Judaism was the first monotheistic religion. Since that time, science and faith have collided in their respective efforts to make sense of the beginning of the world, humanity, evolution, and things life on the planet. The Theory Intelligent Design, simplified, holds that the creation of the earth, its ability to sustain animal and human life, functions like an impeccably designed machine, an engine. In this way, it cannot have been the product of chaos, or, as science holds, the Big Bang Theory. When we think about this theory in terms of what science cannot explain about the world in which we live, then it becomes tempting, if not easy, to agree with intelligent design. William Dembski wrote that contemporary science no longer must explain the past in terms of the enlightenment; rather, science must reconcile religion in terms of a failed enlightenment (Dembski, William, 1960, 12-14). As the comparison is made to the science argument, the Big Bang Theory will for some be less tempting and less easy to agree with.

The Big Bang Theory is based on decades of studying the universe. It is a study that must be approached with caution. The tremendous volumes of data that have been collected over the past two decades alone will take decades more to fully analyze it. Philip M. Dauber and Richard a. Muller (1996) says that the violence of the Big Bang that brought about the creation of the universe and our planet was intensely vicious, far exceeding any violence man has ever committed against man (p. 2). We lack the vocabulary to define and describe it, so we settle for the simplest description, which at the same time helps to create the sense of the event, and it is the Big Bang Theory (p. 2). From the first Big Bang, the universe was created (p. 3). Out of the chaos of that most violent event, the planets formed, and then, two subsequent and violent events on a lesser scale than the first, and the planet Earth was chemically balanced with the elements to evolve and sustain human life.

William Dembski (1960) says that intelligent design is the bridge between science and religion (p. 14). As the body of archeological evidence is uncovered in the search for the past and the beginning of mankind, so, too, is uncovered the evidence that has lessened the gap between religion and science. There is a noticeable change in the attitude of science and religion. Both sides of the argument are less adamant in refuting the other today, and with good reason, too. Science continues to be the investigator that disproves itself, and religion waits patiently to take the glory away from the science each time a new archeological or biological study proves a religious myth no longer to be a myth.

The Religion of DNA

One of the most prominent statements of Biblical creation is, Genesis 1:27, "And God created man to his own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." Recent work on decoding the human genome led to a religiously significant discovery that has since become known as the theory of the "mitochondrial Eve (Witham, Larry a., 2002, 89)."

Mitochondria is a genetic tracer that in 1987, using research that was not in a preliminary stage, experts on both side of the evolution argument ran with that the ancestor of mankind was traceable to a 2000-year-old woman in Africa (Witham, 89). While main stream scientists were reticent about engaging in discussions which might suggest that scientific evidence existed that would call into question evolution, the concept nonetheless came up in science circles again.

This is the specialized world of those who track the genetic timetable backward from the present. It presumes a steady rate of genetic mixing and then calculates mathematically from the modern diversity of human DNA back to its simpler forms in the past. The theory of the mitochondrial Eve was proposed again in 1991 by biochemist Allan Wilson, who "turned back the clock" by using a specialized computer program to study multiracial DNA samples of mitochondria (specialized cell structures that have their own DNA), nearly always inherited from mothers (Witham, 89)."

While some religious leaders simplified the science, saying that it was evidence of creation because it takes mankind back to Eve; the science is not that simple. A Spanish American immigrant who had pioneered work in DNA at the same time that Allan Wilson was discussing his "turned back clock," Francisco Ayala's research actually took the mitochondrial connection back further even than the Biblical Eve (Witham, 89).

That [immune] molecule existed sixty million years ago," he says, "about when the dinosaurs became extinct, before the origination of modern monkeys, let alone humans." By 2001, in fact, Ayala was publishing studies that questioned "whether there is a molecular clock at all," since he found proteins that "evolve erratically," some fast and some slow, despite the neutrality theory that molecules evolve at an even pace -- and thus can pinpoint past branching of organisms (Witham, 89)."

Ayala moves the discussion of the "mitochondrial Eve" back into the realm of science. The challenge from Christianity, however, can counter with a plausible explanation of how the mitochondrial Eve can be older than the Old Testament Eve, and still be the "Christian Eve." James Hope Moulton (1917), in his book, the Treasure of the Magi: A Study of Modern Zoroastrianism, takes the discussion on Christianity back to Persia, and the pre-written word time of the monotheistic Zoroastrians, which some religious historians suggest is the precursor to Christianity.

NINETEEN hundred years ago... Far away in Media, it may be, as they watched the skies for tokens of the future which they believed to be written therein, they had seen a star their practised eyes discerned to be new. It was the Angel of some Great One newly born. In visions of the night it was expounded to them that they should seek a King in Jerusalem and offer treasure in worship. Directed thence by the interpreters of prophecy, they set forth on the south road when the night fell; and the Star rose as they started, and moved to its low culmination, so that as they drew near to the hill on which was the City of David they saw it hang like a golden lamp over the place where their Saoshyant, the 'Future Saviour', lay (Moulton, 2)."

The Magi were Zoroastrians, out of Persia, and their monotheistic faith pre-dates Christianity. As we can see from Moulton's description above, the Magi believed that the birth of their Savior was foretold to them, and they traveled to offer gifts at the feet of the one that they recognized as their King; that was the Christ child. Here, for science, is a connection to Christianity that takes the idea of a mitochondrial Eve back before Judaism, since Zoroastrianism pre-dates even the Jewish Tradition, although it does not have a written book as do the three "book" religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

THE traditional date the Zoroastrians assign to their Prophet is '258 years before Alexander', and for the Persian or Iranian the name ' Alexander'… READ MORE

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