I think the best explanation is that the Bible, while divinely inspired, is a book of spiritual truths, not scientific truths. Sorry the rabbit eats its feces not cud, the earth goes around the sun not the other way around, etc. The fact that the divinely inspired human authors got their science wrong does absolutely nothing to negate the spiritual truths in the Bible, namely that God is all and is in all, that His son died for our sins and only through him can we be saved, etc etc. People seem to think that because Scripture is inspired, that it must be completely without scientific error. Why? Who cares? The point of scripture is to lead to belief in and obedience to God, nothing more, nothing less. The Bible is without error- where we NEED it to be. It will never say Christ died for our sins except those of Jason Smith, who Christ can't stand. It will never say that God is not mostly-mighty, or that anything that is necessary for salvation is not necessary. At least thats the kind of inerrancy that I see it having. People are WAY to literal with a book that was specifically written for nomadic people living several thousand years ago...

So then you are a Modernist.  Right ?  Do you give religious assent of your mind and will to the decree Lamentabili sane exitu of St Pius X, for instance ?

Here are some of the highlights from this list of condemned errors your consideration :

"1. The ecclesiastical law which prescribes that books concerning the Divine Scriptures are subject to previous examination does not apply to critical scholars and students of scientific exegesis of the Old and New Testament.

2. The Church's interpretation of the Sacred Books is by no means to be rejected; nevertheless, it is subject to the more accurate judgment and correction of the exegetes.

5. Since the deposit of Faith contains only revealed truths, the Church has no right to pass judgment on the assertions of the human sciences.

10. The inspiration of the books of the Old Testament consists in this: The Israelite writers handed down religious doctrines under a peculiar aspect which was either little or not at all known to the Gentiles.

11. Divine inspiration does not extend to all of Sacred Scriptures so that it renders its parts, each and every one, free from every error.

57. The Church has shown that she is hostile to the progress of the natural and theological sciences.

64. Scientific progress demands that the concepts of Christian doctrine concerning God, creation, revelation, the Person of the Incarnate Word, and Redemption be re-adjusted."


If you cannot bring yourself to believe in the Scriptures according to the sense that has been determined by the Church, you should humble yourself and keep studying.  You may find that it is not those who defend this sense that are ignorant, but you -- ignorant of science and history and the Catholic Church.  After all, if human knowledge appears to contradict what the Church proposes to us for our belief, that is to say, something revealed by God to men that pertains generally to the salvation of the souls of the Elect of the Church, we can be confident that, later, new findings will rectify any apparent inconsistency.  At least, that is what St. Thomas Aquinas says.  Perhaps you should adopt his epistemology instead of that of the rationalist, which has been amply condemned in a solemn manner by the Church.  If you cannot bear this, let it be known that you would be abandoning the traditional and constant sense with which the Church has believed and prayed in favour of something more aligned with your modern and cosmopolitan sensibilities.  I encourage and admonish you, however, to have faith, rather than let the Holy Wisdom -- Our Lord Jesus Christ -- be a stumbling-block or folly to you.

Here is a releveant passage from the encyclical Providentissimus Deus of Pope Leo XIII, which apparently even contains some infallible teaching (underlined) :

"20. The principles here laid down will apply to cognate sciences, and especially to History. It is a lamentable fact that there are many who with great labor carry out and publish investigations on the monuments of antiquity, the manners and institutions of nations and other illustrative subjects, and whose chief purpose in all this is too often to find mistakes in the sacred writings and so to shake and weaken their authority. Some of these writers display not only extreme hostility, but the greatest unfairness; in their eyes a profane book or ancient docuмent is accepted without hesitation, whilst the Scripture, if they only find in it a suspicion of error, is set down with the slightest possible discussion as quite untrustworthy. It is true, no doubt, that copyists have made mistakes in the text of the Bible; this question, when it arises, should be carefully considered on its merits, and the fact not too easily admitted, but only in those passages where the proof is clear. It may also happen that the sense of a passage remains ambiguous, and in this case good hermeneutical methods will greatly assist in clearing up the obscurity. But it is absolutely wrong and forbidden, either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture, or to admit that the sacred writer has erred. For the system of those who, in order to rid themselves of these difficulties, do not hesitate to concede that divine inspiration regards the things of faith and morals, and nothing beyond, because (as they wrongly think) in a question of the truth or falsehood of a passage, we should consider not so much what God has said as the reason and purpose which He had in mind in saying it -- this system cannot be tolerated. For all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical, are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost; and so far is it from being possible that any error can co-exist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true. This is the ancient and unchanging faith of the Church, solemnly defined in the Councils of Florence and of Trent, and finally confirmed and more expressly formulated by the Council of the Vatican.[/u] These are the words of the last: "The Books of the Old and New Testament, whole and entire, with all their parts, as enumerated in the decree of the same Council (Trent) and in the ancient Latin Vulgate, are to be received as sacred and canonical. And the Church holds them as sacred and canonical, not because, having been composed by human industry, they were afterwards approved by her authority; nor only because they contain revelation without error; but because, having been written under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, they have God for their author."57 Hence, because the Holy Ghost employed men as His instruments, we cannot therefore say that it was these inspired instruments who, perchance, have fallen into error, and not the primary author. For, by supernatural power, He so moved and impelled them to write -- He was so present to them -- that the things which He ordered, and those only, they, first, rightly understood, then willed faithfully to write down, and finally expressed in apt words and with infallible truth. Otherwise, it could not be said that He was the Author of the entire Scripture. Such has always been the persuasion of the Fathers. "Therefore," says St. Augustine, "since they wrote the things which He showed and uttered to them, it cannot be pretended that He is not the writer; for His members executed what their Head dictated."58 And St. Gregory the Great thus pronounces: "Most superfluous it is to inquire who wrote these things -- we loyally believe the Holy Ghost to be the Author of the book. He wrote it Who dictated it for writing; He wrote it Who inspired its execution."59

21. It follows that those who maintain that an error is possible in any genuine passage of the sacred writings, either pervert the Catholic notion of inspiration, or make God the author of such error. And so emphatically were all the Fathers and Doctors agreed that the divine writings, as left by the hagiographers, are free from all error, that they labored earnestly, with no less skill than reverence, to reconcile with each other those numerous passages which seem at variance -- the very passages which in great measure have been taken up by the "higher criticism;" for they were unanimous in laying it down, that those writings, in their entirety and in all their parts were equally from the afflatus of Almighty God, and that God, speaking by the sacred writers, could not set down anything but what was true. The words of St. Augustine to St. Jerome may sum up what they taught: "On my part I confess to your charity that it is only to those Books of Scripture which are now called canonical that I have learned to pay such honor and reverence as to believe most firmly that none of their writers has fallen into any error. And if in these Books I meet anything which seems contrary to truth, I shall not hesitate to conclude either that the text is faulty, or that the translator has not expressed the meaning of the passage, or that I myself do not understand."

Yet, despite a brief sortie into that exact kind of cross-referencing that settles the (completely unnecessary and invented) dispute, you insist on saying that Moses -- the prophet of God -- was ignorant according to modern standards of categorisation and must therefore have just mistakenly recorded what he saw despite not knowing any better... even though this is the Mosaic Law we are talking about, which was revealed to Moses.  

So, maybe the reasons Moses gave for various animals being unclean is false, maybe he fibbed a little bit, maybe he was supplying the reasons for the establishment of the law retroactively, according to what made sense to him ?  Is that what you mean to imply ?  Or do you also not believe that Moses wrote it, and that it's all just a giant paraphrase created by some Hebrew priest in Babylon centuries later ?  Strange to create such a detailed corpus of laws -- including how to slaughter certain animals and how many days a woman is unclean after delivering a boy and what to do with a bread offering on the third day after it was offered -- and then make the casual mistake here and there...

I'm saying that the differentiation of what was chewed, for what biological purpose, in whatever manner other than the observable behavior, was immaterial.  Moses was recording the way by which the unclear animal could be identified.

I invite you to keep in mind that science -- even taxonomy -- has been overturned and amended many times in our own days.  Two hundred years from now, different theories will be dominant.  If it were possible for this exchange to be recorded for posterity, your protests will seem incredibly silly.

Taxonomy, as I stated previously, is based on the evaluation of like morphology.  If a taxonomical system is overturned, then it is almost certainly because of refinement of our understanding of that morphology.  But one cannot equivocate and say that because we rearrange taxonomies that we can expect facts, verifiable facts of nature, to suddenly be no longer accurate or self-consistent.

And I welcome its recording in posterity for I've said nothing which I do not believe to be the truth and nothing for which I feel ashamed.

Yet, taxonomical classification changes all the time as categories are amended and evolve.  Are you a "scientist" of the naturalistic kind by profession or training or something like that ?  It seems to me that there is no reason to have such absolutist opinions in favour of the utility and self-understanding of modern scientists and their peer-reviewed navel-gazing unless one is personally invested in it.  So, are you?

I am a scientist only in the sense that I believe the universe which God has made to be self-consistent, governed by knowable law, and able to be penetrated by that reason which He has given us the purpose of understanding His creation insofar as the limits of our cognition will allow.  I believe that when the fruit of human reason, in dozens of different disciplines and divorced from ideology on either side, presents a near-seamless tapestry of consistent, mutually supportive data, then one repudiates one's God-given intelligence.

Formally speaking, however, science is not my vocation.  You are correct in that I have a personal investment in science, only because I have a personal investment in the notion of a Creator that is just, merciful, and supremely rational, which He must be as He does acts neither without cause nor without foreknowledge of the outcome.  This will be my last response to this, as we both know where the other stands on the subject.  Before, I go I do feel enjoined to quote the same Providentissimus Deus which you would wield like a cudgel:

"To understand how just is the rule here formulated we must remember, first, that the sacred writers, or to speak more accurately, the Holy Ghost "Who spoke by them, did not intend to teach men these things (that is to say, the essential nature of the things of the visible universe), things in no way profitable unto salvation." Hence they did not seek to penetrate the secrets of nature, but rather described and dealt with things in more or less figurative language, or in terms which were commonly used at the time and which in many instances are in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science. Ordinary speech primarily and properly describes what comes under the senses; and somewhat in the same way the sacred writers -- as the Angelic Doctor also reminds us -- "went by what sensibly appeared," or put down what God, speaking to men, signified, in the way men could understand and were accustomed to."

This, to my mind, is the very essence of linguistic phenomenology by which any seeming errors of language or natural process described in Sacred Scripture can be reconciled to observable fact.

I think the best explanation is that the Bible, while divinely inspired, is a book of spiritual truths, not scientific truths. Sorry the rabbit eats its feces not cud, the earth goes around the sun not the other way around, etc.

I have this story about how I put socks and shoes on before I go to mass, but do not be surprised if I show up to mass barefoot as you should not have taken me literally. You see, I put on 'spiritual' socks and shoes. Spiritual truths are based off of historical truths. Change one and you will change the other. The last two centuries has shown us this already.

The fact that the divinely inspired human authors got their science wrong does absolutely nothing to negate the spiritual truths in the Bible, namely that God is all and is in all, that His son died for our sins and only through him can we be saved, etc etc. People seem to think that because Scripture is inspired, that it must be completely without scientific error. Why? Who cares? The point of scripture is to lead to belief in and obedience to God, nothing more, nothing less. The Bible is without error- where we NEED it to be.

Unfortunately these are the ideas of German Idealists, first and second generation Liberal Protestants, Existentialists, Modernists, Historical Critics, etc. Hear St. Basil and St. Cyril of Alexandria instead:

"Some have attempted by false arguments and allegorical interpretations to bestow on the Scripture a dignity of their own imagining. But theirs is the attitude of one who considers himself wiser than the revelations of the Spirit and introduces his own ideas in pretense of an explanation. Therefore, let it beunderstood as it has been written."- St. Basil, Hexaemeron 9.1

"Those who reject the literal sense of the God-inspired Scriptures as something obsolete deprive themselves of understanding what is written in them. For although the spiritual sense be good and fruitful...what is historical in the Holy Scriptures should be taken as history in order that the God-inspired Scriptures be revealed as salvific and beneficial to us in every way."- St. Cyril, Commentary on the Prophet Isaiah, Book 1, Oration 4.

I don't think Pere is being literal, you are.  He is saying that in the original Hebrew, the rabbit's eating process is perfectly described.  In the Latin, St. Jerome says that the rabbit "ruminates," but he may have used that word in a different way since modern scientific categories did not exist back then.  

Is it permissible to say, Pere -- don't jump down my throat, I'm asking in good faith and will correct my opinion when instructed -- that St. Jerome, while not erring, chose a less-than-ideal word, in that Latin simply does not have an ideal word, and that he had to capture the sense of the Hebrew as best he could, so that one would have to interpret the word "ruminate" very loosely?  

The definition of ruminate:  "to chew again what has been chewed slightly and swallowed."  A rabbit, who eats its own feces, does not chew again what has been chewed slightly; what has been digested and excreted is more than slightly chewed... But that is the modern definition.  What if, back then, "ruminate" meant simply to eat anything that has already been chewed?

I am sure there is an explanation, but would not to be a Biblical and language scholar to come up with it.  This is just my guess.

Quote from: theology101

I think the best explanation is that the Bible, while divinely inspired, is a book of spiritual truths, not scientific truths. Sorry the rabbit eats its feces not cud, the earth goes around the sun not the other way around, etc.

I have this story about how I put socks and shoes on before I go to mass, but do not be surprised if I show up to mass barefoot as you should not have taken me literally. You see, I put on 'spiritual' socks and shoes. Spiritual truths are based off of historical truths. Change one and you will change the other. The last two centuries has shown us this already.

Quote

The fact that the divinely inspired human authors got their science wrong does absolutely nothing to negate the spiritual truths in the Bible, namely that God is all and is in all, that His son died for our sins and only through him can we be saved, etc etc. People seem to think that because Scripture is inspired, that it must be completely without scientific error. Why? Who cares? The point of scripture is to lead to belief in and obedience to God, nothing more, nothing less. The Bible is without error- where we NEED it to be.

Unfortunately these are the ideas of German Idealists, first and second generation Liberal Protestants, Existentialists, Modernists, Historical Critics, etc. Hear St. Basil and St. Cyril of Alexandria instead:

"Some have attempted by false arguments and allegorical interpretations to bestow on the Scripture a dignity of their own imagining. But theirs is the attitude of one who considers himself wiser than the revelations of the Spirit and introduces his own ideas in pretense of an explanation. Therefore, let it beunderstood as it has been written."- St. Basil, Hexaemeron 9.1

"Those who reject the literal sense of the God-inspired Scriptures as something obsolete deprive themselves of understanding what is written in them. For although the spiritual sense be good and fruitful...what is historical in the Holy Scriptures should be taken as history in order that the God-inspired Scriptures be revealed as salvific and beneficial to us in every way."- St. Cyril, Commentary on the Prophet Isaiah, Book 1, Oration 4.

Basil and Cyril were very wise and holy men. However, none of their words carry the weight of infallibility. That does not in any way diminish their sanctity or wisdom- it just makes them human beings. Besides,the presence of a few scientific errors in Scripture in no way hinders its efficacy in revealing God and His Son.

Basil and Cyril were very wise and holy men. However, none of their words carry the weight of infallibility. That does not in any way diminish their sanctity or wisdom- it just makes them human beings.

Except that holiness and sanctity are not just confined to moral purity. Holiness is also noetic, or to say it better, that holiness has effects the nous of these men as well.

Besides,the presence of a few scientific errors in Scripture in no way hinders its efficacy in revealing God and His Son.

If you believe that, then you are cutting your legs right out underneath yourself.