How can you trust the Bible when it's so unscientific?
I've been asked this question so many times.
The idea that the Bible is unscientific probably comes from people's perception of the Genesis account of creation in six days, which contradicts their evolutionary science education.
There are several different Christian responses to the whole question of creation-evolution, and I don't want to tackle that issue now. Firstly, I want to combat this common stereotype that the Bible is 'unscientific'.
Christians believe that the Bible is the 'Word of God'. This means that although men wrote it, the words they were writing were given to them by God. They were 'inspired' by the Holy Spirit. God ensured that what they wrote was free from error.
Now God is the biggest, greatest Scientist in the universe! He INVENTED science! He created this incredibly complex universe and all its natural laws and delicate eco-balances come through His design.
So it's unsurprising that the Bible contains various comments that reveal an awareness of science far beyond its historical era, pointing towards God's authorship behind the human writers.
Look at Job 38:31: 'Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades? Can you loose the cords of Orion?'
Only in the last 30 years have we discovered what this verse means- scientists found that Pleiades is a loose cluster of stars, whereas Orion is a tight cluster. God thus is speaking to Job about His formation of the stars, something Job would not have understood but was led to write down.
Job 26:7 states 'He hangeth the world upon nothing', a bold statement regarding the gravitation of the earth that means it doesn't have to be supported by anything physical. At the time, ancient Greeks believed the world was held up by Atlas, and the Muslims believed the world was held up by a bull. The Bible was right.
Isa 40:22 says that earth is spherical: 'He sits upon the circle of the earth'.
And to top it all off, Job 38:14 states that the earth is spinning: 'The earth takes shape like clay under a seal'. What does that mean? Well, a Hebrew seal was a cylinder that you rolled along the parchment- it rotates on its axis. Here is a perfect picture of how the earth moves through space.
Luke also shows that the earth has different timescales, a concept unknown to the people of his day. Luke 17:24-25- 'I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding grain together; one will be taken and the other left.'
Jesus is talking about His Second Coming, and we know there will only be one Day of the Lord. But what do these verses say? Two people are in bed, sleeping- it must be night time. But two women are going about their daily work in the daytime. Thus this shows that when Jesus returns, half the world will be in daytime, and half in night time.
These are just a few examples of how the Bible makes scientific statements that are way ahead of its time. But really, you need to read it for yourself to see how amazingly practical a book it is. Unlike the Qu'ran, which is a collection of Mohammed's sayings, the Bible is a collection of 66 inspired books, which vary in genre from history, poetry, letters and law. You need to be aware of these differences in style when you read it.
This book, 'Dig Deeper' by Nigel Beynon and Andrew Sach, is really helpful in explaining how to read the Bible:
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