Science, Logic and Reason Are Not on the Side of the Nonreligious

Many of the key ideas of the modern world, such as atheism, secularism, science, democracy, and naturalistic humanism, the default worldview of the modern Western secular academy, have their origin in biblical religion. In regard to atheism the first group in Western history to be called atheists was the Christians according to the second century apologist Justin Martyr. Why? Because they didn’t believe in the Roman gods including the gods who inhabited the heavenly bodies. This atheism had its foundation in the prophetic critique of idolatry which was reaffirmed in the teaching of Jesus and Paul.  This was connected with a sign of the emergence of secularism. Ignatius, bishop of Antioch in the late first century, on his way to martyrdom in the Coliseum in Rome, wrote letters to the churches in Asia Minor. In this letter to the church in Ephesus he explained how the birth of Jesus had been revealed: “A star shone in heaven brighter than all the stars. As a result all magic [that is, all magi and astrology] lost its power and all witchcraft ceased.”  Modern secularism is originally based on the biblical insight that only God is holy and divine, the world is creature and thus neither divine nor full of divine beings.

Philosopher Nicholas Berdyaev states “However paradoxical it may seem, I am convinced that Christianity alone made possible both positive science and [technology].  … It is impossible to build railways, invent the telegraph or telephone, while living in fear of the demons. Thus, for man to be able to treat nature like a mechanism, it is necessary for the demonic inspiration of nature and man’s communion with it to have died out in human consciousness.” 

This was illustrated perfectly in a story on the front page of the Boston Globe on February 5th, 1962, about the different reactions in Asia and the West to the simultaneous alignment of five planets and an eclipse of the sun.

For the Asians the eclipse presented a period of great danger, coming as part of an alignment in the Zodiac sign of Capricorn of five other planets as well—Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Hindu, Moslem, and Buddhist communities throughout the Far East held non-stop prayer sessions and sacrifices as the eight heavenly bodies began moving into line yesterday. Miners refused to enter the shafts at Dhanbad in northeast India. An Indian Airlines plane traveled empty to Bombay when passengers failed to show up at New Delhi. Market places closed down and merchants gave free food to beggars to placate the planets. But the eclipse was a welcome event for Americans and other western scientists who gathered at Lae in Australian New Guinea to watch the moon blot out the sun. They were able to carry out planned experiments as the moon moved into position between the earth and the sun at 8:51 a.m. local time (5:51p.m. EST yesterday.)

There is a growing consensus among historians of science that biblical religion  made  major contributions to the rise of modern science. Ian Barbour, former chair of the physics department at Carleton College, has summarized these contributions under the headings of the biblical attitude toward nature and the idea of creation, the medieval conviction about the intelligibility of nature, and the Puritan support of scientific research.  Oxford philosopher M. B. Foster and others have argued at length that the doctrine of creation implies that the details of nature can be known only by observing them and not by deduction from the divine nature, as Greek thought held.  Sociologist Robert Merton has argued that Puritanism gave strong support to scientific work and his thesis has gained acceptance from the historian of science I. Bernard Cohen, among others.  

Finally, theologian John Baillie sees Christian faith as the necessary basis of modern science. He states:

The virtues necessary to [the] advancement of [modern science] are … the Christian virtues of humility, self-effacement, tolerance, impartiality, and a community of thought that transcends all distinctions of class or race or nation; and when those lose their ancient status as absolute standards, the effect on scientific progress may well be disastrous. … I am convinced that if Christian faith should languish, the scientific impulse would in the end languish no less.

A modern example of this is Lysenkoism in the Soviet Union.

Although the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century made an important contribution to the rise of democracy, a more fundamental contribution is to be found in 17th century Puritanism. Economist and Historian R. H. Tawney states: “The foundation of democracy is the sense of spiritual independence, which serves the individual to stand alone against the powers of this world … and it is probable that democracy owes more to Nonconformity than to any other single movement.”  Historian and sociologist Christopher Dawson states: “In England the pure Calvinist tradition was united with that of the Anabaptist and independent sects to produce a new movement which was political as well as religious and which marks the first appearance of genuine democracy in the modern world. And in this revolutionary attempt … the Calvinist conception of the aristocracy of the saints provided the inspiration and the driving force.”   

Naturalistic humanism is the philosophical worldview that affirms that nature is the highest and broadest and category, comprehending all reality. Humanism is the moral commitment to the values of human dignity, freedom, and equality. This worldview is derived from the biblical ideas of creation, the creation of humanity in the image of God, incarnation, and resurrection of the body. Its modern version was introduced by Ludwig Feuerbach, who had a Christian upbringing and graduate study in theology. He was a critic of Hegel and inspired both Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, both of whom stood in the biblical tradition as critics of destructive religion. For example, Marx opined that “The criticism of religion is the premise of all criticism.” Theologian Karl Barth said of Feuerbach that he understood Christian theology better than any other philosopher or theologian of the nineteenth century, and that his thought amounted to a Christian realism in its anti-spiritualism, its attention to the whole person is his earthiness, its this-worldliness, and its assertion of the interpersonal and communal nature of humanity. 

The American version of naturalistic humanism had its home at Columbia University in the work of philosophers Santayana, Woodbridge, Dewey, and Randall. Full disclosure: Dewey was the mentor of my parents and I was raised in this worldview, and it informed my life for over twenty years. I might add that I found the transition from naturalistic humanism to Christian faith quite smooth as can be understood by seeing its biblical Christian origin. Later I concluded, however, that it is not possible to base a humanism on the foundation of naturalism unless it is the tame Christian naturalism of Feuerbach and Dewey rather than the pagan naturalism of Nietzsche.