Science & The Bible: Can they go hand in hand?

They do not go "hand in hand", which would indicate some sort of direct relationship. Science and religion are the two great seekers of truth, but the truth of one is separate from the truth of the other, and the means of attaining each type of truth is likewise different. Science is fundamentally atheistic - which does NOT mean that scientists cannot believe in and worship God in their personal lives. It just means that science by definition is the study of the natural world, without reference to the supernatural. That's why a scientist who is a Christian, another who is a Muslim, and a third who is an atheist can work side by side, make the same scientific observations, and reach the same scientific conclusions.

Likewise, true religion is not involved with science. One who uses the Bible to explore God's relationship with the human race is on solid ground. One who tries to use the Bible as a source of scientific data is headed for trouble, because that is not the purpose for which the Bible was written. Trying to draw scientific information from the Bible is no more valid than trying to draw theological information from a biology book. True science and true religion are completely compatible. Truth cannot conflict with truth. Problems arise only when someone fails to recognize the distinction between the two and tries to force one into the realm of the other.

You must remember that the Bible is a book about God's relationship with man.It isn't and doesn't claim to be a science book. The Bible doesn't even claim to be the last resort on spiritual truth that distinction is given to the church"The Pillar" of truth. If you believe that the Bible is anymore than God's inspired instructions on how ,when and why to love him then you are attibutting to the text meaning that was never intended. Also science cannot prove or disprove God's exsistence as God cannot be observed by mere men and even if a test could be devised there is no way of assuring God's cooperation in such a test.

No. Science is based on observation, analysis and reason and is constantly being refined. The bible is based on the rejection of reality and reason in favor of "faith."

The bible does, indeed, state that the Earth is flat. It also claims that the Sun rotates around the Earth, that bats are a type of bird and countless other ridiculous notions cooked up by ignorant people, one step from the cave, in a region that was even more backwards in the context of its time than it is today.

While science has the ability to advance through new technology and discoveries, the bible and its proponents make no allowance for evidence that contradicts it.

Acceptance of the bible on any level is the same as saying "I choose to be ignorant and nothing will change that."

The bible, the kamasutra, the yellow pages and all other books were written by people, with the knowledge they had at the time of writing, and possibly with errors. There is no reason to believe any of those books contains any info that has been overlooked for so many years by so many users. Oh, and there are no gods, and no revelations, and nothing else in those man-written books.

A lot of this depends on whether you believe the Bible (Torah, in my vernacular) is divinely inspired by God or was actually written by God.

As to my personal belief, the Torah was inspired.

People in that time and place were not aware of other parts of the world, of other animals, plants and such.

So their world in their time had no knowledge of evolution, plate tectonics or even the ice age.

So, yes, they can go hand-in-hand as long as we understand that once we ate from the Tree of the Knowledge, part of our punishment was to seek out and learn, to question and make decisions.

Seeing that God gave us free will, we would be foolish not to pursue scientific endeavors.

And we can still respect the realm of the mysterious and unknown in a spiritual context.

Yes. The problem is it's hard to tell what's useful in the Bible and what's religious/mythical. For example, in the Bible, there's an instruction to leave a field fallow every seventh year. The reason? None given, just that God will punish you if you don't.

Science would talk about crop rotation.

Read Maurice Bucaille's insightful book, 'The Qurán, Bible & science." . You will discover how the qurán speaks about modern scientific discoveries like expansion of the universe, blood circulation and many other scientific facts and this was 1400 years back!

The belief systems are different.

If the Christianity is fundamentalist, no.

If the early Bible is seen a myth, a fable or parable, then there are more connections.

When people are taught something as a child, science,

or a certain religion, it has a flavor of reality to it that transcends mere fact.

Beliefs are the bedrock.

Hi,

I believe that ultimately we'll come to a point where we see that science is God. Many have been very reductionist in their studies and research. No matter how far back we go, or how much we sub divide things; we come to a point where we ask, "Where did that come from?" For example, we can look back to the 'big bang' and say that all started from a tiny blob that expanded greatly, and rapidly. But where did that blob come from? I think ultimately we'll have to say God or something in that realm.

Butch

Not all sciences are stated, and whatever the stated ideas were not able to be illustrated until a scientific research.