I have already answered this. Since I’m a cessationist I believe the only people who have been inspired are those identified in Scripture, and I know that from Scripture itself, which I trust as a reliable record on this point on the basis of many lines of evidence. But this entire discussion of inspiration is irrelevant to the topic at hand.
No. As I told you previously, I have never criticized the medieval Church on the basis that its interpretation was not inspired. On the contrary, I have pointed out that no one needed to be inspired in order to interpret the Bible correctly on this point. The Church just plain blundered through exegetical incompetence.
No.
I’m not just saying I disagree with their interpretation and hermeneutic. I am pointing out that Christians for centuries before Galileo’s time had recognized that interpretation of what Scripture appeared to say about the natural world needed to be tempered with demonstrable facts about the natural world gathered through a process of investigation and testing. With this lengthy background, taking into account the “two books” of God’s revelation, people like Galileo interpreted Scripture correctly when it appeared to contradict scientific findings. People like Bellarmine did not. Galileo was the better exegete, as well as knowing more about the natural world.
I agree. The issue of which interpretations are inspired or not is irrelevant to this topic.
So what? Christians have been hopelessly wrong about the interpretation of Scripture countless times in the past.
Let me know when evolution has been proved false. In the meantime you’ll need to address the fact that over 100 years of research and experimentation have demonstrated its explanatory power, its predictive power, and its real world application to a wide range of sciences.
Yes, but so what?
It is not anachronistic. Augustine had already warned Christians that interpretation of what Scripture says about the natural world, must be tempered by scientific interpretation of physical data. That was over 1,000 years before Galileo, so you can’t possibly say it’s anachronistic. Not only that, but people like Galileo and Foscarini correctly pointed out how in this case the scientifically interpreted physical data necessitated a re-interpretation of Scripture, and demonstrated how to harmonize the two. You can’t say this was anachronistic, because they were contemporaries with the very Church officials who criticized them, like Bellarmine. The hermeneutic applied by Galileo and Foscarini is the same applied to those very passages of Scripture by most modern exegetes today. There’s nothing anachronistic about this at all.
As for your claim “insanity to believe your own interpretation is wrong”,of course no one deliberately holds an interpretation they believe to be wrong. But it is not insanity to believe your own interpretation is wrong and then change your interpretation. Mentally healthy, open minded, rationally thinking individuals do this. People who aren’t thinking properly start with the premise that they are right and can’t be proved wrong. That’s when the problem starts.
No I am not implying it was in the minority. But you haven’t addressed my point. There was already a lengthy Christian tradition of harmonizing science and Scripture, using the very same argument that Galileo used. But the Church did not make use of that tradition, and Bellarmine explicitly rejected that argument. As I said, the Church should have known this. Many people knew this. It wasn’t a novelty and it wasn’t an anachronism. Galileo knew it. Augustine warned about it. The Church just plain blundered.
Of course not, because they didn’t take Augustine’s advice.
They didn’t impose anything on the text. The text was written from the geocentric perspective of the original audience. What the Church lacked was the hermeneutical sophistication to understand that the text could legitimately be read in any way other than teaching that the sun orbits the earth. Contemporaries like Galileo and Foscarini knew better.
No it isn’t, because there were earlier Christians before them who knew better, and there were Christians living at the same time as them who also knew better (such as Galileo and Foscarini). So it’s not historically anachronistic at all. The fact is they were wrong when some of their contemporaries were right.
But it wasn’t established through science. As I pointed out, it was an unsubstantiated claim left over from Aristotle. There was nothing scientific about it.
I agree consensus doesn’t mean unanimity. But you’re missing the point. Unlike evolution, the idea that the universe was infinite in time and space was not a scientifically established conclusion. And just over 100 years ago it was already under challenge on the basis of several scientific arguments which actually argued on the basis of evidence (this began in the eighteenth century). So the consensus had no scientific basis, had not been arrived at through the scientific method, had never been scientifically tested, and had no scientific evidence supporting it. This is completely different to evolution. It’s not remotely a true analogy.
Please show me evidence that there was a scientific consensus that God did not exist. All those peer reviewed scientific papers in professional scientific journals saying “God has been relegated to non-existence”. And I note you keep repeating that irrelevant mantra that science “should trump our theology”. As you have been told by several people in this thread (including myself), that isn’t what is being argued. What is being argued is that our interpretation of Scripture should be tempered by scientifically established facts. And please remember that this excellent advice is not new; Augustine said this around 1,500 years ago.
That is not what I am talking about. I am talking about the claim that God does not exist. That is a philosophical claim not a scientific claim.
In science it has to be established before it becomes consensus. Any time a scientific theory becomes consensus before it is established, there’s a serious problem and it will probably turn out to be wrong. In the case of the universe, the idea that it was infinite in space and time was never established through the scientific method, and the very first time it was tested scientifically it failed.
I did read it. The link was an apologetic article which used the typical bait and switch.
- Galileo didn’t have conclusive proof of his theory (true).
- Other scientists raised valid scientific objections to his theory (true).
- Therefore (and here’s the switch), the Church’s rejection of his theory was valid (false).
The reason why the conclusion is false is because, as I have explained previously, the Church’s rejection of his theory was not based on valid scientific objections, it was based on a flawed interpretation of Scripture. The Church’s objections were theological, not scientific.
Look at what that article claims.
When it comes to the debate between heliocentrism (the Earth goes around sun) versus geocentrism (the Sun goes around Earth), the Church was not the primary opponent to Galileo and Copernicus. The chief opponents of heliocentrism were the secular Aristotelean scientists. The Church simply subscribed to what was the reigning scientific paradigm at the time.
Sorry, “secular Aristotelean scientists”? Which scientists were secular in that day and age? They were all religious. And the Church did not simply subscribe to “what was the reigning scientific paradigm at the time”, it raised specific theological objections to Galileo’s theory. That was the motivation for charging him with heresy and placing all heliocentric works on the Index.
The site also says this.
Who was it that really opposed the idea of heliocentrism?
Both scientists (for scientific reasons), and the Church (for theological reasons). Of course that’s not the answer the site gives. The site says this.
Galileo’s fight was with other scientists, not the Church.
This tries to avoid the fact that the Church’s fight was with Galileo; it not only charged him with heresy, it placed heliocentric works on the Index.
What you said and what I said are perfectly compatible. I have never said interpretation of Scripture was the only reason they attacked him.
I have agreed with this. I have never said that was their motivation.
I have explained this several times, including using Bellarmine’s own explanation.
No. Informed and intelligent readers know that their interpretation is not simply “what it says”. That’s the kind of mistake which people like Ken Ham and Eddie make; they claim that their interpretation isn’t simply an interpretation, it is what the Bible actually says.
OldTimer has helpfully explained how he used to think this way too.
People like OldTimer and I (not to mention professional scholars), understand the difference between “My interpretation of the Bible” (which is “What I think the Bible is saying based on evidence X and reasoning Y to arrive at conclusion Z”), and “What the Bible is actually saying” (which may indeed be different to what I think the Bible is saying).
So to return to the original point, when Christians object to evolution they need to prove they are not making the same silly mistake as the Catholic Church did over heliocentrism. How do you propose to do that?