The Catholic times. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1951-current, 1952-09-19

Genesis And Science
With the appearance of the first volume Of the
new Catholic translation of the Old Testament,
there will no doubt be renewal of interest in what
is perhaps the most difficult portion of the Sacred
Scriptures. the first eleven chapters of Genesis.
Here almost every verse bristles with problems and
obscurites. Genesis speaks for instance of days of
creation where astronomers reckon in millions
and billion of years the sacred author pictures God
as forming mans body directly from the earth while
many biologists regard the human body as the re-
suit Of an evolutionary process the biblical Deluge
covers all the highest mountains everywhere under
the heavens" and thus seems TO demand mass of
water that is nconceyabe the confusion of tongues
at Babel is divine punishment while students of
linguistics have shown that languages multiply
through natural processes OF migration and isolation
AS Catholics we believe that the Bible is di-
vinely inspired that ii is The very word of God.
And if an infalhbe God is its author, how can
IT possibly contain error? But if it is free from
error, how explain the passages which seem TO con
tradict the natural sciences? This is problem which
every Catholic must honestly face. II is impossible,
of course to consider each question in detail here,
but there are a few general principles which will
point out the direction in which the answer lies
Before all else il must be understood that truth
cannot contradict truth for God is the final source
OF all truth and in God there be no contra.
dction True faith never be at odds with true
science. Whatever contradiction appears must nee
essarily be only an apparent one. in that theo-
loglan proposes matter of faith something that
is not of faith, scientist proposes as = matter
of science something that is not science at all In
the past both theologians and scientists have fallen
into this error.
From this principle it follows that we must be
very sure of precisely t0d: the Scriptures teach be
fore we pronounce judgment All TOO often it has
happened that uninstructed readers have read their
meaning into the Bible and made Gods word re.
sponsble for the things 1T does not teach al all.
NnWt discovery
lures the meaning which they really intend TO con
vey, is not as easy the layman sometimes sup
poses. When God inspired the Bible He had per
force 10 make of human speech and human
modes OF speech. And the modes of speech were of
necessity those that prevailed in the time and place
in which the books were written Here face the
major difficulty OF Interpretation As Pope Plus
XII puts IT, The ancient people of the East, in or
der TO express their ideas. did not always employ
those forms Of speech which toda" but fath-
er those used by the of their times and eoun-
tries. What those exactly were, the commentator
cannot determine IL were IN advance. but only
after careful examination of the ancient liter
ature of the East" In short the student OF the
Bible must forget that he is Occidental of the
twentieth century. he must train himself to think
as did an Oriental of 1000 and more years ago
Herein lies the solution OF the problem of the
Bible VS. science Difficult rs il may be for ms TO
believe the ancient Hebrew was not at all inter
ested in science as we understand ii today. He
our own Where we see host of secondary causes
and natural laws in operation and make them the
object Of inquiry, he all things caused by
God, the First Cause. For him. thunder was the
voice" Of God, plague was the hand of God,
sun and moon lamps set by God In the flrma-
ment 10 regulate days and seasons. If he had been
told that thunder was the result of electrical
phenomenon that plague was due TO the aetlv-
ity OF certain bacteria that the moon in
all probability part Of the earth which had been
twAw fffH haRn
been bored indifference.
Written in such an atmosphere, then, the Bible
should be the last place in the world TO look for
scientific information ITS concern is with other,
infinitely more important matters II speaks TO us
OF Cod and Gods way with man. As the saying,
usually attributed to Cardinal Baronus neatly
puts il THE Bible intends to teach us how to go
10 heaven, not how the heavens go" Or ST. Au-
Pustine "Chrst to make uS Christians not
astronomers" Therefore to speak of scientific
in the Bible Is Senseess as 10 speak of his
torca errors in Shakespeares Hamlet or to com.
plain that Keats Ode 10 a Grecan Urn is not
accurate treatment OF the science of ceramics.
contradiction is collision of idea, but there can
be no collision when two objects arc on two alto.
Fether different tracks This is precisely the case
with the Bible and the natural sciences, Hamlet
complains Of his too too solid flesh" and no
physicist in the audience will stand up to explain
that this flesh far from being solid is mostly empty
snace with lonely atom whizzinp about here and
there The fisherman wili boast about catching
five pound bass and chthyologist will protest
that from the viewpoint Of science IL isn't bass
but member Of the sunfish family. Even an as
tronomer sitting in easy chair will say that he
Is AT rest and who will tell him that astronomieay
speaking he is nothing of the kind that he is actual
~ involved in the most complicated set Of mo
tions about the axis of tho earth, about the sun.
about the ealaxys center of rotation? Hamlet. the
fisherman, the astronomer; each is reht-from
his particular point of view So arc the Scriptures
right-from their non-scientific point of view.
ar VIII