God and the Astronomers, by Robert Jastrow: W.W. Norton and Co., New York; 1978, 136pp.
Until the Sun Dies, Robert Jastrow: W.W. Norton and Co., New York; 1977, 172pp.
Robert Jastrow comes with scientific credentials in order. He is the Director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies of NASA, professor of Astronomy and Geology at Columbia University, and professor of Earth Science at Dartmouth College. His writings range from the popular to the profound. These two editions serve as a sample of the former.
God and the Astronomers traces the development of what some call the “Big Bang Theory.” The study of astronomy leads to a new theory, that the universe was created in a brilliant explosion of light and heat. His description of the theory leads the Christian to the account of God’s creative work found in Genesis 1:3, “And God said, ‘Let there be light.’ And there was light.”
One theme running through the book is the reaction of prominent scientists to the thought of a beginning. Many simply refused to accept the idea in spite of evidence and arguments. He quotes such giants as Eddington and Einstein to the effect that such ideas are senseless and repugnant. Further studies only strengthened the theory until today it is widely accepted.
The other stand which surfaces in this book shows the theological implication. As Jastrow states it, “The scientist has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.” Such was the trauma within the circles of science over the evidence for creation.
Now the Christian reader of Jastrow’s little book would hope to see evidence of a belief in God. How can you have creation, especially with a theory that admits a sudden beginning, without a God who creates? Since the scientific theory has at least some parallels to Genesis one, you might hope for a recognition of the personal God who is. And if you are an optimist you might even scan the pages to see if this creation theory has led him to some knowledge of the Word through Whom all things were made. On the very first page, the scientist dashes any such hope. “When an astronomer writes about God, his colleagues assume he is either over the hill or going bonkers. In my case it should be understood from the start that I am an agnostic in religious matters.” Well, Well; what went wrong?
That Robert Jastrow r emains agnostic in religious matters is due to his faith. His position is clear. The clarity of his stated position helps us to understand the insides of a modern scientist. In Until the Sun Dies he writes a surprisingly honest statement. When discussing the origin of life, he says:
“Perhaps the appearance of life on earth is a miracle. Scientists are reluctant to accept that view, but their choices are limited: either life was created on the earth by the will of a being outside the grasp of scientific understanding, or it evolved on our planet spontaneously, through chemical reaction occurring in nonliving matter lying on the surface of the planet.
“The first theory places the questions of the origin of life beyond the reach of scientific enquiry. It is a statement of faith in the power of a Supreme Being not subject to the laws of science.
“The second theory is also an act of faith. The act of faith consists in assuming that the scientific view of the origin of life is correct, without having concrete evidence to support that belief.’”
Now that’s honesty! This statement also tells us what went wrong. Now we know why Jastrow remains agnostic in religious matters. It is a question of faith. This scientist so believes in science that other beliefs are incompatible. He assumes that truth and knowledge come to us by way of the mind of man scientifically analyzing the facts at his disposal. He has chosen to believe that such scientific thinking is the way to truth and he has made the wrong choice. In spite of his claim to be agnostic in religious matters he has a religion after all.
In this he has company, for he sits along with many others in the shadow of Immanuel Kant. That old philosopher took his axe to the tree of knowledge and split the thing in two. Ever since a double shadow has been cast upon the thinking of many, including the philosopher, the scientist and even the theologian. On the one hand, you will see sitting in the shadow of the tree those who claim that truth comes through the examination of the facts by the mind of man. On the other hand, there is t he modern notion that religious truth must be unconcerned with propositions and facts.
Our scientist, along with many others has chosen to live in the shadow of the scientific side of Kant’s monstrous tree. Such people claim that t he other half of the tree doesn’t concern them because it has nothing to do with scientific thought. What can be truly known, must be known by the mind of man thinking scientifically. The rest is but pre-scientific, unscientific, religious, or mythical thinking. God, for example, cannot be the genuine concern of the scientist in the laboratory. The astronomer cannot point his telescope to the heavens and photograph God in the act of creation, and so he claims that he cannot know whether or not God exists. He cannot know whether God created the heavens and the earth. No one can truly know, because of the way we are sup· posed to know truth, only through scientific thought.
Like all other modern thinkers, Jastrow s hows a deep inconsistency when he speaks of faith. Evolution is a truth, he claims, even though you cannot take it into the laboratory and demonstrate its validity. How can this scientist know that evolution is true? He believes it. Suddenly, he takes a jump to the other half of Kant’s bifurcated tree of knowledge. There is a warning for us in that leap of his to the other side of the tree.
First we want to take a closer look at that second book, Until the Sun Dies. By means of this vehicle we travel from the so called moment of creation through the evolutionary past, into the present and on to the glorious future. If the scientist has a faith (he does), then here is a “bible” created to compliment that faith. It has a “Genesis,” a history of salvation by the grace of natural selection, an expression of thanksgiving to our animal forebears whose struggles have produced us. It also presents an eschatology that looks to the heavens in hope of greeting some intelligent beings that may populate a planet circling a distant star.
Jastrow’s books are interesting. Give him credit for communicating difficult concepts. I’d give him a high mark for honesty. The books can also serve a purpose for which they were never intended. They warn of the folly of taking one’s place beneath the old Kantian theory of knowledge.
Who are these people we see when peering into the shadows? Here you see a man in black garb intently studying a shroud, purported to be the cloth in which the body of Jesus was wrapped. He spends his time and energy trying to prove that this is the cloth left in the empty tomb in the hope that modern man will accept this as some evidence that Jesus was raised from the dead. Over there you see men on an expedition to Mt. Ararat. For similar reasons they wish to prove that the ark really did exist and want to bring back some concrete evidence for the laboratory to support the truth of the Bible. Such proofs will not be heard. They have forgotten the Lord’s parable which said, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.” That grey–haired professor with the scholarly stoop who brings his scientific standards to the scriptures remains unconvinced. We hear him mumble that it is impossible to accept miracles. He too enjoys the shade of the ancient tree.
Of greater concern are the theologians who keep their cool in the “religious” side of Kant’s tree. We are safe from the attacks of science, they are thinking. God’s word must be divorced from facts and propositions and then no one can disprove the faith. Some say that it doesn’t matter whether or not Jesus was actually raised from the tomb, you must believe it anyway for faith and fact are separate.
You will find people closer to your home and church trying to say the &arne thing, if only in timid ways at first. You hear, don‘t you, that the infallibility of God’s word is no crucial matter since God speaks through His Word anyway. Or you may hear your friendly Reformed theologian on the skids try to argue for a concept of truth that is divorced from facts and propositions. Truth, well that’s the faithfulness of God, they say. Let’s not get propositions entangled with truth. Please stay out of the scientists’ arena when you talk of religion, is another way to say it.
Jastrow‘s little books demonstrate that the theologian who wants to sit under the shade of the Kantian tree of split knowledge has no defense against an aggressive scientific approach to life. The scientist does not content himself with one side of the affair. We have seen how easily he leaps to his own faith conclusions. He too believes. And how viril and appealing is this faith which claims the authority of fact, proposition and science. How anemic and pale are the modern theologies of today beside our ruddy believer in science! Where, by contrast is the authority of the modern theologian, and of those imitators who wish to be modern at least in the little ways. Where, I ask, is the authority of one who has lost his grip on the Bible, and can no longer say with any real meaning, “God has spoken”?
It is past time that Christians in science, in theology, in the laboratory, in the seminary, and more importantly, I think, the Christian is astride the tractors on the laundry routes, or behind the desk, approach the Kantian tree of knowledge with the sharp toothed saw of revealed truth and cut it down. Has not the Creator through whom all things hold together, by whose principles nature functions, revealed Himself in the Bible, His Holy Word? Can people who know Him, who fellowship with Him through the scriptures, in whose heart the Spirit lives, endure a mad if modern division of thought? Can people who know the Savior’s prayer, “Sanctify them in the truth, Thy word is truth,” allow a divorce between fact and faith, science and religion? Will those in whose heart lives and abides that Counselor who leads to truth accept a framework of truth and knowledge alien to Him? The answer, I think, is plain. Those who know Him, who fellowship with Him through His word and Spirit, are called to see His truth in the world about us, to behold Him revealed in scripture, and to fearlessly say that God’s truth includes propositions, beginning with “God is,” Praise His holy name.
W. Kooienga is pastor of the Faith Community Christian Reformed Church of Wyckoff, N.J.