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Who Wrote What When: The Bible, Science and Criticism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 May 2012

Geert Lernout
Geert Lernout
Affiliation:
Departement Letterkunde, Universiteit Antwerpen, Stadscampus, S.D.136, Grote Kauwenberg 18, 2000 Antwerp, Belgium. Email: geert.lernout@ua.ac.be
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Abstract

According to the traditional (or ‘whig’) interpretation of history, sometime in the seventeenth century science was born in the form that we know today, in a new spirit that can best be summed up by the motto of the Royal Society: nullius in verba, take nobody's word for it. In the next few centuries this new critical way of looking at reality was instrumental in the creation of a coherent view of the world, and of that world's history, which was found to be increasingly at odds with traditional claims, most famously in the case of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. By the end of the nineteenth century, the divide between science and religion was described by means of words such as ‘conflict’ and ‘warfare,’ the terms used by John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White in the titles of their respective books: History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874) and History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1896).

Type
The Bible
Information
European Review , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , 02 May 2012 , pp. 301 - 315
Copyright
Copyright © Academia Europaea 2012

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