Can Science and the Bible agree?

TRUTH FOR TODAY

Jun Malazo

The popular opinion in the scientific community is that science does not, nor will it ever, agree with the Bible.  This idea was birthed from the basis that science is based on fact, and that the Bible is based on faith.  While there are some that say the Bible and science cannot agree, I want to propose that the two actually do.  Someone said, “Science and the Bible are two different ways of looking at the world.  One is mainly concerned with spiritual matters; the other on physical matters.  But on occasion the two overlap.  When they do, there is no conflict.” Sir Isaac Newton also said, “Don’t doubt the Creator because it is inconceivable that accidents alone could be the controller of this universe.”

Author John Hudson Tiner suggests that there are a number of reasons why some believe these two ways of looking at the world can never harmonize.  One is the fact that the Bible does not use modern day scientific terminologies.  This is due to the fact that the Bible was written before the beginning of science.  Rather, the Bible uses everyday language common to man. Tiner explains the following:

“As an example of this, a scientist would say that rain is caused by condensation of moisture from the aqueous vapor in the atmosphere.  Gravity causes the liquid to fall to the earth.

The Bible, on the other hand, describes rain this way:  ‘All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.’  (Ecclesiastes 1:7, KJV)

The Bible description is good science.  That is exactly how it happens.  No matter how the language is changed to put the statement into scientific terms, the Bible account is one of the briefest, most concise, and accurate descriptions of the water cycle.  No scientist could improve on it in as few words.”

Another reason for believing that the Bible and science cannot agree is the fact that some words have multiple meanings.  This causes people to misunderstand the Bible.  Instead of investigating further, they accept science as fact.

Tiner adds, “The most disturbing reason for differences between science and the Bible is due to some scientists (but not all, by any means) who seem to get a special delight out of attempting to make the Bible appear inaccurate about scientific matters.”

We need to recognize that scientists are not inerrant. History shows us over and over again wrong observations that were made by prominent scientists.  Many scientific discoveries and observations of the past have been proven wrong over time.  Whereas, the Bible has been tested and proven accurate for thousands of years. 

The Bible has been accused of being a book of outdated superstitions written by people who do not understand how the natural world works.  This claim cannot be further from the truth.  In fact, the Bible contains many scientific facts that were written thousands of years before the scientific community discovered them.

For instance, today we know the vital importance of blood to the life of our bodies.  According to Medical News Today, “Blood has a number of functions that are central to survival, including: supplying oxygen to cells and tissues, providing essential nutrients to cells, such as amino acids, fatty acids, and glucose, and removing waste materials, such as carbon dioxide, urea, and lactic acid.”

Without blood we cannot survive.  However, this fact was not known in the past and caused many scientists to make tragic mistakes.  In the nineteenth century doctors believed that harmful vapors entered the blood causing many sicknesses.  For this cause, doctors would literally drain blood from patients by cutting veins and arteries on their patients’ arms.  One such tragic event was when the first president of the United States, George Washington, came down with a cold and his doctor ordered for his blood to be drained.  George Washington was literally bled to his death.  The British Columbia Medical Journal indicates that it wasn’t until the late nineteenth century that blood-letting was discredited as a treatment for diseases.

How is this related to the Bible?  The Bible has always viewed blood as essential to life even thousands of years before the lethal practice of blood-letting was introduced.  Notice the following verse in Leviticus 17:11:

"For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul."  (Leviticus 17:11, KJV)

Additionally, the Bible says in Leviticus 17:14 that, “. . .for the life of all flesh is in the blood thereof.”

Another scientific concept is the understanding of germs.  In 1847, one of every six women who gave birth in a hospital died.  The scientific medical community was amazed at such a high rate of death.  It was discovered that it was a common practice among doctors during this time to wash their hands without any germ-killing agents.  They would reuse towels and other instruments without proper sanitation.  Also, doctors would perform autopsies and then examine live patients unaware that they were passing germs from one place to another.

When the practice of proper hand washing was implemented, the doctors were amazed that the death rate plummeted from 18% to only 2%.  The scientific community celebrated their amazing new discovery.  However, was it really a new discovery or is it possible that the doctors just rediscovered what had already been known for centuries? 

Thousands of years before, the Bible told us:

"He that toucheth the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days. He shall purify himself with it on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean: but if he purify not himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean."  (Numbers 19:11-12, KJV)

There are many more scientific discoveries that confirm the Bible.  For centuries people thought that the earth was flat until Ferdinand Magellan circumnavigated the world in the 1500’s.  But Isaiah wrote in 700 BC, "It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:"  (Isaiah 40:22, KJV)

Today scientists claim that the earth hangs upon nothing and is suspended in space due to gravity.  They credit this discovery to a mathematician and physicist named Isaac Newton in 1687.  He realized that some force was acting on falling objects.  He learned that the moon was circling the earth, and it would move away in a straight line if were not for some force.  Later Newton would published what is known as his three laws of motion and developed mathematical proof of elliptical planetary orbits.  He called this force “gravity” and determined that gravitational forces exist between all objects orbiting around the sun.

About 3200 years before Newton’s discoveries the Bible says:

"He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing."  (Job 26:7, KJV)

Kyle Butt of Evidence for God’s Word said, “The Bible never gets a simple medical fact wrong, and exhibits a knowledge of scientific facts thousands of years ahead of its time.  This proves that the Bible is of divine origin.”

In closing, the Bible is not primarily a scientific book.  It is a book designed to reveal God to mankind.  Science can agree with the Bible because scientific discoveries have confirmed the Bible.  In the words of the famous physicist, Albert Einstein, I quote, “The more I study science the more I believe in God.”