A “Systematic Theology” of a “Religion Based on Science” A Study in the Book Science Ponders Religion -- By: Gilbert B. Weaver

Journal: Grace Journal
Volume: GJ 06:3 (Fall 1965)
Article: A “Systematic Theology” of a “Religion Based on Science” A Study in the Book Science Ponders Religion
Author: Gilbert B. Weaver


A “Systematic Theology” of a “Religion Based on Science”
A Study in the Book
Science Ponders Religion

Gilbert B. Weaver

Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies
John Brown University

The book Science Ponders Religion is a symposium edited by Harlow Shapley, and published in 1960 by Appleton-Century-Crofts, Incorporated, of New York. This book, according to the jacket, is by “a group of the country’s most eminent scientists, who examine a problem which has puzzled and enthralled mankind, in the light of the most recent scientific knowledge.” The jacket further explains:

Since the first fumbling steps toward scientific knowledge, there has been a continuing war, sometimes hot and sometimes cold, between science and religion. It has involved the most sophisticated as well as the most uneducated minds. Its martyrs have been many. Yet it may well be that science will become the revealer, and not the antagonist, of religion; that religion will be redefined in such a way that its God is the natural and not the supernatural Creator; and that these concepts will constitute the basis of a world religion of the future.

A reading of the book indicates that the blurb is accurate. The symposium writers indeed suggest that a “new religion” is to be developed on the foundations of science, and they are in the vanguard of that movement. This writer feels that their comments provide enough breadth of scope that a “systematic theology” of this “scientific religion” could be traced, at least in outline. This study is an attempt to do this.

Such a study as this is clearly justified by the nature of Christian apologetics. It is part of the function of the apologete to “scout out” or explore opposing religious systems. Christianity is best defended from attacks by philosophical and religious systems if these are clearly understood. This study is thus an attempt to understand a religion which is intended by its founders to rival and eventually supersede true Christianity.

The study is organized along the lines of traditional theological categories, with a few exceptions. The general content of the sections is as follows: Section one discusses the views of the writers of Science Ponders Religion on the question of religious authority, comparable to Bibliology in the Christian system. Section two deals with their views of man and Section three their views of God, reversing the order of Christian theology, since Christian systematics is

theocentric, while their view is anthropocentric. God is created in man’s image, instead of vice versa.

Section four combines the writers�...

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