This is a story about Galileo Galilei. It's not the story about an enlightened scientist being persecuted by a narrow-minded Catholic Church because that story is (mostly) a myth. It's not a story about a great scientific genius either, though he was that (mainly). It's also not a story about someone being reincarnated with the soul of the old astronomer like the song by the Indigo Girls that, for a few weeks in '92, I thought was (almost) profound. (And I should point out that it not an original story but one that cribbed together from other sources.)
But like all good stories this one provides a (mostly) valuable lesson.
In Galileo's day, the predominant view in astronomy was a model first espoused by Aristotle and developed by Claudius Ptolemy in which the sun and planets revolved around the earth. The Ptolemic system had been the reigning paradigm for over 1400 years when a Polish Canon named Nicholas Copernicus published his seminal work, On the Revolution of the Celestial Orbs.
Now Copernicus' heliocentric theory wasn't exactly new nor was it based on purely empirical observation. While it had a huge impact on the history of science, his theory was more of a revival of Pythagorean mysticism than of a new paradigm. Like many great discoveries, he merely took an old idea and gave it a new spin.
Although Copernicus' fellow churchmen encouraged him to publish his work, he delayed the publication of On the Revolution for several years for fear of being mocked by the scientific community. At the time, the academy belonged to Aristotelians who weren't about to let such nonsense slip through the "peer review" process.
Then came Galileo, the prototypical Renaissance man, a brilliant scientist, mathematician, and musician. But while he was intelligent, charming, and witty, the Italian was also argumentative, mocking, and vain. He was, as we would say, complex. When his fellow astronomer Johann Kepler wrote to tell him that he had converted to Copernicus' theory, Galileo shot back that he had too--and had been so for years (though all evidence shows that it wasn't true). His ego wouldn't allow him to be upstaged by men who weren't as smart as he was. And for Galileo, that included just about everybody.
In 1610, Galileo used his telescope to make some surprising discoveries that disputed Aristotelian cosmology. Though his findings didn't exactly overthrow the reigning view of the day, they were warmly received by the Vatican and by Pope Paul V. Rather than continuing his scientific studies and building on his theories, though, Galileo began a campaign to discredit the Aristotelian view of astronomy. (His efforts would be akin to a modern biologist trying to dethrone Darwin.) Galileo knew he was right and wanted to ensure that everyone else knew that the Aristotelians were wrong.
In his efforts to cram Copernicanism down the throats of his fellow scientists, Galileo managed only to squander the goodwill he had established within the Church. He was attempting to force them to accept a theory that, at the time, was still unproven. The Church graciously offered to consider Copernicanism a reasonable hypothesis, albeit a superior one to the Ptolemaic system, until further proof could be gathered. Galileo, however, never came up with more evidence to support the theory. Instead, he continued to pick fights with his fellow scientists even though many of his conclusions were being proven wrong (e.g., that the planets orbit the sun in perfect circles).
Galileo's fatal mistake was to move the fight out of the realm of science and into the field of biblical interpretation. In a fit of hubris, he wrote the Letter to Castelli in order to explain how his theory was not incompatible with proper biblical exegesis. With the Protestant Reformation still fresh on their minds, the Church authorities were in no mood to put up with another troublemaker trying to interpret Scripture on his own.
But, to their credit, they didn't overreact. The Letter to Castelli was twice presented to the Inquisition as an example of the astronomer's heresy and twice the charges were dismissed. Galileo, however, wasn't satisfied and continued his efforts to force the Church to concede that the Copernican system was an issue of irrefutable truth.
In 1615, Cardinal Robert Bellarmine politely presented Galileo with an option: Put up or Shut up. Since there was no proof that the earth revolved around the sun, there was no reason for Galileo to go around trying to change the accepted reading of Holy Scripture. But if he had proof, the Church was willing to reconsider their position. Galileo's response was to produce his theory that the ocean tides were caused by the earth's rotation. The idea was not only scientifically inaccurate but so silly it was even rejected by his supporters.
Fed up with being dismissed, Galileo returned to Rome to bring his case before the Pope. The Pontiff, however, merely passed it along to the Holy Office who issued the opinion that the Copernican doctrine is "foolish and absurd, philosophically and formally heretical inasmuch as it expressly contradicts the doctrine of Holy Scripture in many passages..." However, the verdict didn't stand and was quickly overruled by other Cardinals in the Church.
Galileo wasn't about to let up, though, and to everyone's exasperation, pressed the issue yet again. The Holy Office politely but firmly told him to shut up about the whole Copernican thing and forbid him from espousing the unproven theory. This, of course, was more than he was willing to do.
When his friend took over the Papal throne, Galileo thought he would finally find a sympathetic ear. He discussed the issue with Pope Urban VIII, a man knowledgeable in matters of math and science, and tried to use his theory of the tides to convince him of the validity of his theory. Pope Urban was unconvinced and even gave an answer (though not a sound one) that refuted the notion.
Galileo then wrote A Dialogue About the Two Chief World Systems in which he would present the views of both Copernicus and Ptolemy. Three characters would be involved: Salviati, the Copernican; Sagredo, the undecided; and Simplicio, the Ptolemian (the name Simplicio implying "simple-minded"). And here is where we find our hero making his biggest blunder: he took the words that Pope Urban had used to refute his theory of the tides and put them in the mouths of Simplicio.
The Pope was not amused.
Galileo, who was now old and sickly, was once again called before the Inquisition. Unlike most suspected heretics, though, he was treated surprisingly well. While waiting for his trial, Galileo was housed in a luxurious apartment overlooking the Vatican gardens and provided with a personal valet.
In his defense, Galileo tried a peculiar tactic. He attempted to convince the judges that he had never maintained nor defended the opinion that the earth moves and that the sun is stationary and that he had, in fact, demonstrated the opposite by showing how the Copernican hypothesis was in error. The Holy Office, who knew they were being played for fools, condemned him as being "vehemently suspected of heresy", a patently unjust ruling considering that Copernicanism had never been declared heretical.
Galileo's sentence was to renounce his theory and to live out the rest of his days in a pleasant country house near Florence. Obviously the exile did him good because it was there, under the care of his daughter, that he continued his experiments and published his best scientific work, Discourses on Two New Sciences. He died quietly in 1642 at the ripe old age of 77.
As the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead wrote, "In a generation which saw the Thirty Years' War and remembered Alva in the Netherlands, the worst that happened to men of science was that Galileo suffered an honorable detention and a mild reproof, before dying peacefully in his bed."
As Paul Harvey would say, now we know the rest of the story. So what can we learn from this tale? I think it provides different lessons for different groups of people.
For scientists it shows that if you are in agreement with most of your colleagues, you will most likely be forgotten while history remembers some crank. For advocates of Intelligent Design theory it teaches that claiming your theory is correct is no substitute for backing it up with experiments and data (even if you are right). For aggressively self-confident people the lesson is that sometimes being persistent and believing in yourself will just get you into trouble. For Catholics it provides an example of why you shouldn't insult the Pope.
I suspect that there are many more lessons that can be gleaned from this story. But I find that the real moral is not so much in the story itself but in the fact that the story even needs to be told in the first place. While I first heard the story of Galileo in elementary school, it wasn't until long, long after I had graduated from college that I finally learned the truth. No doubt some people are just now hearing about it for the first time. How is that possible?
I suspect it may have something to do with the fact that for centuries people like Bertrand Russell, George Bernard Shaw, Carl Sagan, Bertolt Brecht, and the Indigo Girls have been passing on the myth. I don't think any of them were intentionally lying. In fact, I doubt any of them ever bothered to examine the facts themselves. They didn't need to. The story fit what they already believed -- that science and religion were natural enemies -- and that was all they needed to know.
It would be easy to mock such gullibility and intellectual laziness. But the truth is that I'm probably guilty of doing the same thing quite often. Perhaps it's because I was a once a journalist (sort of) that I am more apt to believe whatever version of a story I find more interesting. As a newspaper editor I often favored David over Goliath, even when the powerful Philistine was more credible than the person slinging the stones. "Boy Shepherd Slays Powerful Giant" always makes for a better headline.
As a Christian, though, I don't have the option of favoring the position that will sell more newspapers. Instead, my duty is to side with the truth. When I hear a story that fits my agenda I should examine all the relevant facts before accepting it as Gospel. I may not always be absolutely certain which side of the line the truth lays. But I do know on thing for sure: That is the side that God will be on.
Sources:
Home run, Joe. :-)
Yes, the Galileo myth is persistent and pernicious. Your presentation is good, from what I've read about it (and I hope folks will look at the books you link), though maybe a little soft on the Catholic church--the Whitehead quote's mention of Alva helps put it in perspective. The moral of the story is not so much "medieval Catholicism wasn't as bad as all that" as "it wasn't about science at all, and no one thought it was"; the Kepler & Copernicus accounts being the key data, here.
You were too irenic to mention the mendacity with which this story has been turned to propagandistic effect, though: see White (http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/andrew_white/Andrew_White.html)
and Draper (http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/draper00.htm)
then take a look at this brief summary of their contributions (http://www.asa3.org/ASA/education/science/conflict.htm).
Cheers!
PGE
Sorry for double-posting, but I forgot you don't autolink in comments:
White
Draper
Hi Joe,
You make some interesting points here. And certainly we can always use reminders to be on guard against paradigmatic interpretation. I do have a small historical quibble, however, with your comment that Galileo's defense (that he had never held or defended Copernicanism) was a "peculiar tactic" by which he attempted to play the Inquisitor for a fool.
The reason that Galileo took this particular line was that he had been explicitly warned, in writing, that he was not to teach or defend that the sun is stationary or that the earth moves about it. He was also verbally warned not to hold to those positions. There was a question, however, of whether he could discuss Copernican theory hypothetically, or by way of demonstrating its error.
This sort of thing was not unprecedented. For instance, Rome was actually involved in publishing Galileo's work, but required that he include arguments against Copernicanism. This led to one of his poorest decisions, as you point out, when he chose to put the Pope's favorite argument in the mouth of the Fool.
At his trial, Galileo maintained that he did not recall whether or not he was forbidden to hold Copernican beliefs. He claimed that he simply relied on the written document (which only forbade teaching and defending). But the inquisitor determined that the verbal prohibition against holding the beliefs had indeed been given and was binding. Referees were then asked to reread the work in question and determine whether or not it indicated that Galileo had in fact held these beliefs. It was their positive answer to that question that sealed the author's fate.
"He was attempting to force them to accept a theory that, at the time, was still unproven."
There is no such thing as a "proven" theory. In fact,there is no such thing as a proven ANYTHING in science. Gravity is not a proven theory. Theories are not facts,nor will they ever "graduate" to become facts...theories are explanations of observed fact and it is the apparant inability among christian cultists of seeing a distinction between theory and fact that leads them to embrace such nonsense as creationism,ID,original sin doctrine and so on.
Let's add that Rome was not doing simple Bible study with its cosmology but was adding Hellenistic philosophy, just like they did with transsubstantiation. This is one of Rome's consistent and persistent problems. What does this mean? It means that, when Galileo is pitted against the authority of the Church (Rome) he should be pitted against Aristotle & Co., with the church being the conveyor of those errors. Rome's cosmology was wrong, not because the Bible was wrong, but because the Greeks were wrong.
Collin
http://evangelicalperspective.blogspot.com
"Rome's cosmology was wrong, not because the Bible was wrong, but because the Greeks were wrong."
What little is know of biblical cosmology from the few passages that even mentions it does not point towards an agreement with galileo...far from it in fact...or with the rest of reality for that matter. In short,biblical cosmology was every bit as wrong as greek cosmology...it was just being completely wrong differently.
There is no such thing as a "proven" theory. In fact,there is no such thing as a proven ANYTHING in science.
Perhaps "proven" was a poor choice of words, but that is the language most people use. While theories do not become "facts" as we understand the term, those that have repeatedly been supported by evidence have a weight that those with no support do not enjoy.
Don't forget They Might Be Giants' song Particle Man! It espouses how Triangle Man (the church) hates Particle Man (scientists), and when they have a fight, Triangle wins.
Excellent. You just don't see enough evidence for the importance of They Might Be Giants in the world.
An excellent post from Joe:
I'm reminded of the whole Thomas Jefferson having a kid with one of his slaves affair. At that time I remember we had learned and respected Jefferson historians who asserted it was impossible because they just 'knew' him from his political and philosophical writing. They just knew he wouldn't do a thing like that...even though Jefferson, like most of his time, said little or nothing about sex in his writing. Their mental picture of him, though, turned out to be wrong when DNA nailed Jefferson (sorry for the pun).
What's similiar to Joe's story is how we come to understand things. We do it by constructing a narrative in our head, a little story to put it all together. This happens all over, we have narratives on just about everything....George Bush ---"dumb frat boy", Bill Clinton ---"Crafty liar", P. Hilton---"ditzy heiress", and so on.
While the narrative helps us make sense of things it leaves us vulnerable to a selection bias. We only see facts that fit our narrative and are blind to facts that don't. If you think your fat friend is suffering from some medical problem with his metabolism then you see him eating salad and say "I feel so bad, he's trying to eat like a rabbit and can't loose weight"....if you think he is fat because he is just too lazy to take care of his body you may say "look, stuffing his face again. I bet he's telling himself that he's eating healthy while he globs that dressing on his salad...its' probably his 5th meal of the day!"
Here we got an easy to understand narrative. Brave scientist tries to patiently explain the truth to arrogant authority figures who don't believe him and instead try to punish him. It almost writes itself (it almost does...think of every cheesy diaster and monster movie or a bit better think of the beginning of the first Superman movie).
The price we pay is unless we work really hard (which we would if we were writing a 400 page biography of G or reading it) we miss part of the truth. Perhaps the authority figures were actually ok guys, perhaps the scientist was a real jerk. But there is a benefit we get from this, and that is the truth of the narrative. Dogma should not trump the evidence, denial is a bad thing. That too is true even if the characters we choose to illustrate it don't exactly fit the bill. Likewise if we didn't have this technique we wouldn't have history. History would be an unworkable mountain of facts that we couldn't make any sense of.
Lud,
You're partly correct. The ible is not a textbook on anything. All of the theology, both primitive and developed, deals with other subjects by implication so that drawing off principles can be tainted, as happened with Rome. Even your perception of error is quite tainted.
Collin
http://evangelicalperspective.blogspot.com/
Although Copernicus' fellow churchmen encouraged him to publish his work, he delayed the publication of On the Revolution for several years for fear of being mocked by the scientific community. At the time, the academy belonged to Aristotelians who weren't about to let such nonsense slip through the "peer review" process.
Totally. It was fear of being mocked by the scientific community that did him in. He was never going to get his work published in the journals of the day. Isn't it silly that people would think he was afraid to publish for fear of being killed or tortured by the inquisition? We all know that the inquisition had protections against frivolous charges, and always gave the accused due process and a fair sentence.
Case in point: house arrest turned out to be an awesome deal for Galileo. I'm sure we all know some people who would benefit from a little house arrest, eh?
You also forgot that the church banned heliocentrism and Galileo's works as part of its decision against him. The church was responsibly safeguarding science from idle speculation.
We really don't have to explain why the church is the rightful arbiter of proper scientific methods, of what can be published about physics (or anything else), and why it has the right to impose criminal sanctions against scientists who violate the rules. It's obvious.
There's a Galileo myth alright. And you're the one perpetuating it.
While those are interesting details (mostly), these facts remain:
1. Galileo was right.
2. The Church was wrong.
3. The Bible was wrong.
4. Theocracy is wrong.
The Bible was wrong.
How so, ex-preacher?
P.S. Given that you believe the Bible was and is wrong, I am thankful that you are an ex-preacher.
1 Chronicles 16:30 "The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved."
"Eppur si muove." (And yet it moves.)
-attributed to Galileo
The Bible has no true scientic content. When Scripture touches on topics that intersect scientic inquiry, that citing comes from the mouths of the ancients, and is necessarily swathed in metaphor, hyperbole, and anthropomorphism. The ancients described the physical realm, not as trained theorists, but as untrained observers. We see, therefore, the sun rising and racing through the sky like a bridegroom, but any attempt to promote this prosaic metaphor to Biblical scientific error, is noticeably desperate. We may assume the ancients thought the sun rose (moved about the earth). We may not assume that, with this observation, Holy Writ sought to explain the cosmos and blundered. The terracentric metaphors of the OT are of human perception, not of divine bad science. The medieval Roman church was wrong in its belief that the Bible espoused a terracentric position. It therefore, never had a valid inquisitional argument against any heliocentric “heresy.” Moderns who describe the OT in terms of scientic terracentrism are also wrong. If one insists on parsing OT metaphors for scientific accuracy, then having the sun move at all could be seen as a statement of galactocentrism, in which the sun, indeed, moves. The ancients were not reaching for a cosmological centrist theory of any sort. They were just looking up.
4. Theocracy is wrong.
Why is theocracy wrong? Maybe, it's like Communism in that it has never really been tried.
ex-preacher,
The Bible is even more stupid than you give it credit for. What about Luke 5:22: Jesus knew what they were thinking and asked, "Why are you thinking these things in your hearts?" Everyone knows we think with our brains and not our hearts. Jesus must not have known what he was talking about.
MichaelRoy,
I believe I understand what you are saying - that science and religion are in two different realms, or what Stephen Jay Gould called Non-Overlapping Magisteria (NOMA). He said "the magisterium of science covers the empirical realm: what the Universe is made of (fact) and why does it work in this way (theory). The magisterium of religion extends over questions of ultimate meaning and moral value. These two magisteria do not overlap, nor do they encompass all inquiry (consider, for example, the magisterium of art and the meaning of beauty)."
I think there is some merit in that, except that many religious books, including the Bible, do make scientific and historic claims that are either true or false. Too many Christians try to have it both ways by claiming divine inspiration for the whole thing but attributing any shortcomings to human authorship. If you want to say that the Bible is a human product and thus reflects the human understandings and misunderstandings of the ancient world, then we are in agreement.
I think you'll find that most evangelicals claim that the Bible does make scientific claims and that they are always 100% accurate. They teach that Genesis 1-3 is to be believed literally. Thus Joe slips in his own mythology by making the absurd comparison of ID creationists to Galileo (both courageously going against the consensus of their times). Sorry, folks, but being out of the mainstream is no guarantee of being right.
So pick one:
1. the Bible makes no claims subject to verifiability or potential falsification, or
2. it does.
Why is theocracy wrong? Maybe, it's like Communism in that it has never really been tried.
So you had a system where the Church is able to issue criminal sanctions all the way up to death with torture for heresy. Could explain to me how that is not theocracy?
pgepps: Excellent response – and bang-on in regards to the fact that many use the distortions of White / Draper for anti-Christian propaganda. I also agree that Joe may have been somewhat soft on the church here – it was definitely a “political” fight (not a scientific one). Yes the “myth” of a virtuous Galileo is wrong but I don’t think the Church was much better. (For a good balanced take on this, I recommend Lindberg’s essay in “When Science and Christianity Meet”.)
Colin: I wouldn’t want to lay all the blame on a Roman Church blinded by Hellenism in an effort to wash all our hands. We (modern Evangelicals) have our own intellectual baggage (eg. Baconian “fact based” view of science – see for eg. Noll’s “The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind”).
And unfortunately, the anti-Christian propagandists have one part of their “story” correct. In many ways, modern Evangelicals are reacting to Darwin very similarly to the way the Catholic Church responded to Galileo. (Ok, not the inquisition stuff). The Dec. 2007 “Perspectives on Science and the Christian Faith” journal has an excellent article on “Using Galileo to Teach Darwin”.
ex-preacher: I don’t think this simple either-or characterization is valid. Christians (at least those that accept the orthodox creeds – one of the qualifications for being an Evangelical) believe that Jesus Christ is fully divine and fully human - not 50% God-50% human, not sometimes God & sometimes human, not God looking like a human, and not a human with God like qualities but 100% God and 100% human. Our scriptures are the same – both 100% divine and 100% human. Peter Enns has a great discussion of this in his book “Inspiration and Incarnation”.
Wow I went to a Christian college and I didn't even learn this half of the story.
Excellent post, Joe! A classic example of what I come to EO for. It's too bad some people can't seem to get over their own biases enough to appreciate it.
Ex-Preacher: Come on, man. Even most hard core atheists can understand when a passage of the bible is in a poetic context (which that verse from Chronicles undoubtedly is). I'm all for being frankly critical of the Bible but get your stuff together next time.
1. the Bible makes no claims subject to verifiability or potential falsification, or
2. it does
It does. Jesus was crucified under Pontius Pilate, the temple was destroyed in 70AD, the Jews were exiled to Babylon in 586 BC, Paul was held in house arrest in Rome. All histroical facts, all verifiable.
I also would disagree in your charterization of biblical authorship. I believe the traditional Christian position is that while the writers were inspried, God did not dictate the Bible verbatim to the authors. The style of writing, viewpoint and knowledge of each book's author comes through because they were written by the men, not copied down from God as a scribe would copy the words of a king. we see this in the writers of the four gospels. Each chose different aspects of Christ's life to emphasize. For example Matthew approaches the gospel from the most Jewish worldview, while Luke the most Greek.
Communism has never really been tried! That's the stupidity of the West. Must be from having a public education. ;)
Marxist governments have been attempted many times. They've all failed miserably. The philosophical failure shows itself in its dependence upon external capital to operate. The functional failure has been its inevitable collapse either through dissolution (USSR) or progressive capital influence (as we see in PROC).
Communalism is not Communism. The idealism that westerners like to hear is not what Marx was talking about. Marx espoused violent overthrow and totalitarianism -- USSR, PROC, etc.
The Amish have a Theocracy that is generally effecitve and has been fully functional for several centuries. Nobody is ever burned at the stake. Ref. Paradise, PA. The concept of Theocracy is not necessarily wrong, but we all have problems with Rome's implementation.
And let's not forget the Left's "scientific" lies.
Take a close look at the Soros-funded and outrageously exagerated counts of people killed in Iraq. It's pretty sick, besides anti-American. Criticism of a policy or practice of an administration is one thing, but those numbers and secretive funding go beyond mere criticism.
Collin
http://evangelicalperspective.blogspot.com/
Collin,
Fact is there's no way to make an accurate count of people killed in Iraq when it isn't even safe for a survery taker to go door to door. BTW, great job staying on topic. Focus man, focus.
Communalism is not Communism. The idealism that westerners like to hear is not what Marx was talking about. Marx espoused violent overthrow and totalitarianism -- USSR, PROC, etc.
True, Marx was very clear that communism was a stage after full industrial capitalism was reached. It's not a lot of organic farmers. Needless to say, ideology for many is only as thick as the paper it's written on. When the chance to impelement it arrived in Russia and China few said "wait a minute, the playbook says we have to first become a rich capitalist industrial nation!"
The Amish have a Theocracy that is generally effecitve and has been fully functional for several centuries. Nobody is ever burned at the stake. Ref. Paradise, PA. The concept of Theocracy is not necessarily wrong, but we all have problems with Rome's implementation.
It's unclear what the Amish would do with full political power. No one said that it was impossible to ever have a 'good king' or benevolant dictator. Certainly there are historical examples where individual men turned away from abusing the power they have but human nature is consistent enough (if not always) to tell us a theocracy would degenerate pretty quickly into something bad. To say it doesn't have to be is a bit like saying communism was never really tried.
Anyway, the Amish do not have gov't power. They are a theocracy in the same way a private club can be a theocracy. The worse they can do is expel members but they don't have the power to inflict criminal sanctions on them or violate their rights.
ex-preacher:
1. the Bible makes no claims subject to verifiability or potential falsification, or
2. it does.This isn't the logical disjunct that you were looking for. Okay, it might have been what you wanted, but it's not the proper disjunct:
1'. Either the Bible makes no claims subject to verifiability or potential falsification, or:
2'. it makes some such claims.
What you obviously wanted to in asserting (2) was to say that all of the claims in the Bible are subject to these things, but the opposite (disjunct) of none is some, not all.
Talk about missing the point. Joe was cautioning proponents of that theory against the sort of false identification with Galileo as a "rogue scientist" by saying that (and I quote, with emphasis) "claiming your theory is correct is no substitute for backing it up with experiments and data (even if you are right)". It's like you saw "ID," and a little alarm went off in your head telling you to object to whatever it was that was said. Come on, now, let's have some critical thought.Now that I think about it, there's another source I've seen on this issue, although I can't for the life of me remember where it was (although I'm fairly certain it wasn't Whitehead or Draper). It went into much more details about the politics behind Galileo and the rival groups that he pitted himself against (or that pitted themselves against him - and these weren't religious groups). There is a great deal more depth than the myth gives, but then again, that's sort of typical of myths - the less detail, the better.
So you had a system where the Church is able to issue criminal sanctions all the way up to death with torture for heresy. Could explain to me how that is not theocracy?
Well, theoretically, the Church had quite a lot of legal authority, but practically, all the countries of Europe had kings or some other type of monarch who actually wielded power. The reign of Henry VIII is a good example of who really had power, as is the Western Schism in which King Phillipe IV of France basically installed his own Pope when the one in Rome didn't agree with him. Both of these events happened before the time of Galileo.
Communism has never really been tried! That's the stupidity of the West. Must be from having a public education. ;)
Dude, I was kidding. Haven't you ever heard someone of the left make the absurd statement that "true Communism" has never failed because it has never been tried?
Ex-preacher asserts: "The Bible was wrong."
I ask: "How so, ex-preacher?"
Ex-preacher responds with:
1 Chronicles 16:30 "The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved."
"Eppur si muove." (And yet it moves.)
-attributed to Galileo
That's simply ridiculous. I almost feel bad for guffawing so much. That proof-text verse that you pulled from 1 Chronicles 16:30 is part of the lyrics of a psalm (song) of thanks that David wrote to the Lord God.
You honestly thought that one song verse was meant and intended as scientific certitude by King David in the Old Testament???
As stated previously, I'm immensely grateful that you're an ex-preacher.
Boy, that Galileo was a real jerk! And wasn't the church patient with him! Those history books are so messed up. It's O.K. to muzzle the truth and oppress scientists if they are obnoxious.
Next in the series: those harpies in Salem Village asked for it.
Boonton,
We were talking about science and measurement, but I did reach just a bit. We are also, more broadly, in a conflict where the Left questions the credibility of the the Right's efforts. The credibility of the critic is worthy of return fire.
Don't limit your idea of a Theocracy to one particular structure or type. The Amish method is, most often, a Christian form of government, though it is quite different from the postmillennial approach. (Some of their groups are merely cultural enclaves.) They are self-governing, which is why it a long, long time for the local police dept. to get to the murder scene. They do not need to be policed from the outside.
Everybody has an ideology, some just more refined than others.
Collin
http://evangelicalperspective.blogspot.com/
Okay, kids, here's a challenge for you. Read Psalm 104 and tell me which parts are allegorical poetry and which parts, if any, are supposed to be accurate and literal accounts. I'm pretty sure you'll conclude that verse 5 ("He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved.") is pure metaphor. Then read Genesis 1-3 and tell me if any scientific claims are being made there. Or is it all poetry?
Here's a useful hypothetical for evangelicals. If some scientific discovery were made that seemed iron-clad and completely contradicted something in the Bible, would you:
A. conclude that the science had to be wrong and was perhaps demonic?
B. re-interpret Scripture to fit with science?; or
C. conclude that perhaps the Bible is not inerrant?
And what if you found dozens of such cases - would your reaction change any?
Actually, Christian Cynic, I was responding to this part of Joe's essay: "Galileo began a campaign to discredit the Aristotelian view of astronomy. (His efforts would be akin to a modern biologist trying to dethrone Darwin.)"
This little exchange brings this gem from C. S. Lewis to mind:
There is no need to be worried by facetious people who try to make the Christian hope of 'Heaven' ridiculous by saying they do not want to spend eternity playing harps'. The answer to such people is that if they cannot understand books written for grown-ups, they should not talk about them.
If some scientific discovery were made that seemed iron-clad and completely contradicted something in the Bible, would you:
Well, as our good friend Ludwig so cheerfully informs us, "There is no such thing as a "proven" theory. In fact,there is no such thing as a proven ANYTHING in science.". That would seem to make your hypothetical somewhat implausible.
Ex-preacher:
Are B and C mutually exclusive?
Okay, kids, here's a challenge for you.
Not so fast, slick Willie. Not until you acknowledge that you committed a faulty exegesis of 1 Chronicles 16:30 and wrongly asserted that it was an example of a scientific statement from Scripture.
Acknowledge, own up to, and repent of your error. Unless, of course, your pride prevents you from owning up to your proof-texting mistake.
ex,
It would be impossible for there to be a scientific discovery that contradicts God's truth. All truth is God's truth. As regards to Psalm 104, you must be the only person who reads poetry instead of science to understand natural history and geology. Do you read Shakespeare for help in understanding chemistry? Is "Ode on a Grecian Urn" a good place to start learning about ancient archeology?
Then read Genesis 1-3 and tell me if any scientific claims are being made there.
Science, by definition, excludes the Supernatural as an explanation.
Genesis 1:1a "In the beginning God..."
That is not a scientific statement, per se. But nonetheless, it remains a transcendent, objective, universal, clear statement of understanding held by and asserted by Christians, Jews, and other theists.
Christians: "In the beginning God..."
Atheistic Science or Atheistic Worldview or Neo-Darwinian Macro-Evolution: "In the beginning... there is no God. The cosmos, random chance, and lots and lots of time produced life as we know it today."
Ex-preacher, maybe God's purpose is for you to wander around in the desert as an ex-preacher, and then to turn around, repent, and to offer your testimony as a warning to others.
Hey, Joe, do you have anything that could be used to prove what you wrote? I've tried to convince my friends about this but they just dismiss it as religious propaganda, and I've been trying to find a historical source of some kind of something to show them they're wrong.
"Well, as our good friend Ludwig so cheerfully informs us, "There is no such thing as a "proven" theory. In fact,there is no such thing as a proven ANYTHING in science.". That would seem to make your hypothetical somewhat implausible."
There is still ample room in science for reasonable certainty...wherever you are able to make accurate predictions on a given phenomenon based on a particular scientific theory regarding that phenomenon for exemple..thats as certain as you ever get in science but its enough for anyone but the most irrational skeptic to operate in...look at it this way...when was the last time you fired up your computer while genuinely wondering if it would actually boot up?
Talk about missing the point. Joe was cautioning proponents of that theory against the sort of false identification with Galileo as a "rogue scientist" by saying that (and I quote, with emphasis) "claiming your theory is correct is no substitute for backing it up with experiments and data (even if you are right)". It's like you saw "ID," and a little alarm went off in your head telling you to object to whatever it was that was said. Come on, now, let's have some critical thought.
I admit an alarm went off in my head when I saw "ID". We've gone thru such endless debates about evolution here that I'm always expecting pure insanity to follow whenever Joe mentions ID, but this time he actually did get it right. I remember when we were debating ID several posters had come up with carefully designed experiments that IDers could do (one could be done on a desktop computer) to support their case. The typical reaction was sophisms such as if we did such an experiment the results wouldn't matter since the experiment was 'designed' so would be the results thereby proving the point.
Collin
Don't limit your idea of a Theocracy to one particular structure or type. The Amish method is, most often, a Christian form of government, though it is quite different from the postmillennial approach. (Some of their groups are merely cultural enclaves.) They are self-governing, which is why it a long, long time for the local police dept. to get to the murder scene. They do not need to be policed from the outside.
But when a murder does happen, however rare that is, it is the local police that come. The Amish are under no law enforcement that you or I are not also under. Their power to enforce religious laws is entirely voluntary. I'm still unclear how your use of the term wouldn't apply to just about any organization that has any type of self-governance at all. The Christian Book of the Month Club could likewise be seen as a self-governing theocracy...except when an editor is found murdered it's the local police that are again called.
ucfengr
Well, theoretically, the Church had quite a lot of legal authority, but practically, all the countries of Europe had kings or some other type of monarch who actually wielded power. The reign of Henry VIII is a good example of who really had power, as is the Western Schism in which King Phillipe IV of France basically installed his own Pope when the one in Rome didn't agree with him. Both of these events happened before the time of Galileo.
And why would a King go through the trouble of installing his own Pope? Because the head of the Church is a powerful position in a theocracy.
ex
A. conclude that the science had to be wrong and was perhaps demonic?
We've seen plenty of examples of this. The ID crowd, the young earthers (anyone who says the earth only 'looks old' is basically saying this).
B. re-interpret Scripture to fit with science?; or
This is the most popular option and used by the more intelligent. It is also quite logical and it's done not just with Christianity but everywhere...Islam, Mormonism, the Constitution etc. If you assume A and B are true but they appear to be in contradiction it is quite logical to suspect your understanding of A is flawed and needs correction.
C. conclude that perhaps the Bible is not inerrant?
Well what was the choice you made wasn't it?
Truth
Atheistic Science or Atheistic Worldview or Neo-Darwinian Macro-Evolution: "In the beginning... there is no God. The cosmos, random chance, and lots and lots of time produced life as we know it today."
There is no such thing as "Neo-Darwinian Macro-Evolution" and even if there was it wouldn't make a statement like that. The production of life from non-living things would be a theory of abiogensis. While the term does not get as much ink as evolution mostly because its theories are not as easily summarized in laymens terms like evolution is, they are nonetheless a different field and one that Darwin had little to say about.
And why would a King go through the trouble of installing his own Pope? Because the head of the Church is a powerful position in a theocracy.
No, in a theocracy the "Pope" would be the absolute ruler. In this case, the pope served at the pleasure of the secular king, and while he had some symbolic power, he had no real authority to do anything. It's quite a stretch to call that a theocracy.
Again I would say a society where the church can inflict criminal sanctions including death and torture for heresy is a theocracy. I would say that condition still applied even with Phillipe IV of France. (My history here is weak, though, if he governed as a secular ruler let me know).
That doesn't mean that non-religious issues are never considered or that non-clerics can never carry any political power. Using your definition even Iran couldn't be called a theocracy since they do have elections and non-mullahs do wield power.
Again I would say a society where the church can inflict criminal sanctions including death and torture for heresy is a theocracy.
Well, I could say that 2+2=5, but saying it doesn't make it so. In a theocracy, the Church or religious leader is the absolute power; in pre-Enlightenment Europe, the Church needed secular permission to act. Ergo, not a theocracy.
Using your definition even Iran couldn't be called a theocracy since they do have elections and non-mullahs do wield power.
In Iran, the secular rulers are subservient to the mullahs, in pre-Enlightenment Europe, the religious leaders had to rely on secular rulers to exercise any power. That is the difference. In Iran, the supreme religious leader can overrule the president, in "Western Schism" France or in Henry VIII's England, the King could overrule his "Pope". That makes it by definition, not a theocracy.
I notice ex ran away from this comment thread. That's probably for the best, as I think the mercy rule like they have in little league needed to be invoked. I'm always amazed that ex was really a preacher at all, his grasp of the Bible seems so limited and incomplete.
Boonton, thanks for fairly conceding what Joe was saying. (As an aside, I've always thought you a reasonable dissenter when dissent was reasonable, and this thread has only reinforced that impression.)
ex-p:
But this is even more ridiculous: Joe is simply noting that Aristotelian cosmology was the reigning paradigm in Galileo's time, just as neo-Darwinism (e.g., evolutionary theory after the modern synthesis) is the reigning paradigm in biology. There is no judgment made about it, nor is ID implied - it's simply a comparison that we can understand in modern times. I assumed that you were referring to the explicit mention of ID because it seemed like a more charitable conclusion; assuming what you did from the above quote is even worse! My statement about critical thought still applies.I didn't run away, just waiting for some serious answers to the questions I posed. It is revealing that most of the responses consist of ad hominems. Why is that such a large part of the "argumentation" by evangelicals? Do you think that insulting me somehow elevates your position?
ex,
Well its pretty hard to take you seriously when a number of people answered your question and blew your premises out of the water. Then, instad of addressing their rebuttals you accuse them of launching ad hominems. Why don't you address what ucfengr, Wonders for Oyarsa, Truth Unites and myself said? Weak.
Boonton: You're waxing anachronistic. The question you have to ask yourself is this: was the idea of liberal democracy--as understood in the early 21st century--even on the conceptual radar in 16th century Europe? Of course it was not. It would be like asking a fish, "Have you considered non-water?"
Let me recommend the book by Thomas Woods, How the Catholic Church Saved Western Civilization. It is very good, and shows that virtually everything we take for granted today--from constitutional government, to due process of law, to the separation of church and state, to modern science--has the consequence of a worldview forged by Christian civilization in the middle ages. My colleague Rodney Stark has offered a similar analysis in several of his books.
Frank
Well, I could say that 2+2=5, but saying it doesn't make it so. In a theocracy, the Church or religious leader is the absolute power; in pre-Enlightenment Europe, the Church needed secular permission to act. Ergo, not a theocracy.
That's a narrow definition of theocracy. The so called "secular" leaders imposed religious orthodoxy on their subjects. It doesn't matter to the subject whether he's being forced into a narrow belief system by an ecclesiastical or a "secular" authority. In some instances, as with Henry VIII, the distinction didn't exist.
So according to this post, the Church was a patient, long-suffering institution dealing gently with an irascible and at times unsufferable old codger.
Please.
They threatened him with torture. Over a scientific disagreement. They banned heliocentrism.
How you could ever think this episode redounds to the benefit of the Church's reputation is beyond me.
That's a narrow definition of theocracy.
No, it the textbook definition of a theocracy.
The so called "secular" leaders imposed religious orthodoxy on their subjects.
This seems a rather broad definition of a theocracy. Using this definition I could make a pretty good case for Soviet Russia or Communist China being a theocracy, which is just silly.
Okay, I have to ask it: Where in Joe's entry does he even imply that the Church gets off the hook for Galileo?
Personally, I've always seen the unveiling of the myth as debunking the notion that the Galileo incident was about religion vs. science, thus starting an age-old conflict. It's not about saying that the Catholic Church was necessarily justified at all (although the accusations thrown at it are greatly overstated, as Joe has mentioned; compare the kind of house arrest that Galileo received to the house arrest of, say, Paris Hilton). This seems to be yet another example in the comments here of jumping to conclusions simply without any evidence to support them.
ucfengr
Well, I could say that 2+2=5, but saying it doesn't make it so. In a theocracy, the Church or religious leader is the absolute power; in pre-Enlightenment Europe, the Church needed secular permission to act. Ergo, not a theocracy.
That would be a great definition for an absolute theocracy just like an absolute monarchy would be a gov't where the monarch has absolute power. That leaves out theocratic (and monarch) governments that do not rest absolute power in one entity.
In other worlds, England was still a monarchy after the Magna Carta even though the King was not absolute.
In Iran, the secular rulers are subservient to the mullahs, in pre-Enlightenment Europe, the religious leaders had to rely on secular rulers to exercise any power. That is the difference. In Iran, the supreme religious leader can overrule the president, in "Western Schism" France or in Henry VIII's England, the King could overrule his "Pope". That makes it by definition, not a theocracy.
My understanding is that there's a more complicated structure than that. The clerics can reject candidates from standing in elections but they cannot force their candidates to win. Likewise they can veto laws passed but they cannot force their own laws. Without doing more research, which I will not be doing, I don't think you can clearly say that the secular rulers in Iran have no political power or the Mullahs have unchecked absolute power.
Christian Cynic - Thanks for the compliment!!!!
Ex
I didn't run away, just waiting for some serious answers to the questions I posed. It is revealing that most of the responses consist of ad hominems. Why is that such a large part of the "argumentation" by evangelicals? Do you think that insulting me somehow elevates your position?
A fair demand, I did try to answer your question although you may have missed it because I'm often on the 'other' side here. All 3 options you present are logically valid ways to respond to what would appear to be a conflict between text that is considered true (whether that be Scripture, the Koran, the Constitution, the writings of Marx, or the Star Trek franchise) and what we observe thru scientific observation. You've choosen the third option, which was to reject the original premise that the text is true. That's perfectly acceptable but logically there's nothing that says the first two options (deny the observation or revise one's reading of the text) are inherently less acceptable. On the contrary, consider this:
Imagine we uncover a flat map of some alien world that is reachable by some type of Stargate or whatever your favorite sci-fi method is. You make repeated expeditions to this alien world using the map as a guide. You begin to notice things that don't make sense. For example, the map says that "Northland" is ten times as big as "Middleland" yet when you visit there and walk around its coast you find it is only 1/10th as big. You again have several ways to resolve this:
1. Assume something was wrong about the way you measured-perhaps the aliens have 'cloaked' a portion of Northland or set up a deception.
2. Assume you're reading the map incorrectly and try to reconcile a new reading with your observations.
3. Assume the map is simply wrong.
All three of these options can be true
Imagine a text was written or inspired by an infinite entity. Such an entity would face a problem. Putting a big truth into text leads to distortions. Think of a map of the world. Because you are trying to put a 3-d structure onto a 2-d structure you end up with Greenland looking like it is as large as North America. There are ways to get around that problem but they introduce other distortions. A 'true map' might be much more complicated than it appears at first glance. It might very well be that #3 is the only truth and that's it but it may also be that 1 and 2 are at play.
I'm not saying you're wrong for opting for #3 instead of #2. Adherents to a text sometimes do embrass themselves with convoluted readings to reconcile things that are better resolved by #3 (or #1). Not for nothing does text based religions makes good training ground for lawyers. But you should leave the door open to #2.
Francis
Let me recommend the book by Thomas Woods, How the Catholic Church Saved Western Civilization. It is very good, and shows that virtually everything we take for granted today--from constitutional government, to due process of law, to the separation of church and state, to modern science--has the consequence of a worldview forged by Christian civilization in the middle ages. My colleague Rodney Stark has offered a similar analysis in several of his books.
I'll try to grab the book when I have time. But everything today sits as a result of the past. I would suggest that what we are today is as much a result of what we choose to leave behind as it is what we choose to keep going with. One of the things left behind was theocracy. Perhaps we left it behind because of the influence of the Catholic Church (even, paradoxically, as the Catholic Church was a chief inspiration for those who did not want to leave it behind!). It's kind of strange to credit theocracy for the rejection of it, don't you think? Kind of like giving Stalin and Mao a medal for inspiring us today to reject communism.
I suspect if I read the book I'd find some of the seeds of liberal democracy were there, even in the 16th Century. For example, I'm sure there were intellectuals who argued for open debate inside the Catholic Church or Christian religion who nonetheless failed to apply the idea to include tolerance for non-Christians.
That would be a great definition for an absolute theocracy just like an absolute monarchy would be a gov't where the monarch has absolute power. That leaves out theocratic (and monarch) governments that do not rest absolute power in one entity.
If the secular authorities can trump the religious ones, then it is not a theocracy. It is clear that in the case of pre-Enlightenment Europe, the secular authorities had the final say, so it was not a theocracy. A secular ruler allowing a church to have authority in a limited sphere is not a theocracy, even if they have broad powers within that sphere.
BTW--Good response to ex's query.
By secular ruler you mean anyone who isn't a Pope? Keep in mind the Kings of Europe also claimed religious authority (both in rebellion against the Pope and in alignment with him). Your argument might be right if Europe really did have a secular authority back then that trumped religious ones but I don't think you can make the case that it did.
Great post, Joe -- and so timely. (No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!)
The easy narrative of Science & Galileo being True against Religion and the Inquisition is what anti-Christians bring up, again and again.
And, with respect to rejecting Copernican Sun-centered theory, the Church rejection was wrong.
But Galileo was, in tides and at other points, also wrong.
It's funny how there can be two or three or more versions of wrong. The wrongness of EVERY 3-d reality shown on a 2-d map is an excellent illustration of this.
By secular ruler you mean anyone who isn't a Pope? Keep in mind the Kings of Europe also claimed religious authority (both in rebellion against the Pope and in alignment with him).
By this standard, a theocracy is any form of government where the secular leader goes to church. I thought all those decrying the coming American theocracy were silly, but really they were too late, the US already is a theocracy.
No I think the standard I presented was very clear. If you can be charged with a crime for holding a 'wrong' religious belief then you live in a theocracy.
Tom
The easy narrative of Science & Galileo being True against Religion and the Inquisition is what anti-Christians bring up, again and again.
As they should, the Church still comes off very badly. Galileo's chief 'sin' was that he was fanatical about advocating his theory. Look back at Joe's story again and note the areas where he says things like "Galileo's biggest mistake was..."
One more thing:
If the secular authorities can trump the religious ones, then it is not a theocracy.
So if, say, the Tehran Parking authority has complete authority over issuing parking tickets and is totally secular then that would save Iran from the charge of being a theocracy? see the problem with that def. now?
Except you forgot to ask who it was that gave the Teheran Parking Authority the wherewithall to issue all the parking tickets. Even if the agency didn't have its theocratic political appointees and was totally secular, how would that save Iran from being a theocracy if the TPA was empowered by the theocratic powers of the government?
A pretty good exposition -- only thing I would add is that a key factor of importance was the notion of what constitutes science -- Galileo had some radical ideas on that too, if he did not his confrontation with contemporary biblical interpretation wouldn't have happened.
I just did a blog post with a very summarised version of my take on the Galileo myth if you want to check it out -- http://anadder.com/what-was-galileos-trial-about
One problem with the whole debate on the theocracy of Europe...in the true sense of the word, it wasn't a theocracy. There is only one true theocracy that has ever been tried, and that was Israel prior to their kings. A more correct term would be an ecclesiocracy. The theocracy is a people ruled by a God, or incarnation of a God, where an ecclesiocracy is a people ruled by a church or religious entity. So, the original statement is truly false, since a theocracy was actually practiced, and failed, because we are fallen and sinful, and need immediate supervision.