Science And The Eastern Orthodox Church

Science and the Eastern Orthodox Church explores core theological and philosophical notions and contentious topics such as evolution from the vantage point of science, Orthodox theology, and the writings of popular recent Orthodox critics as well as supporters. Examining what science is and why Eastern Orthodox Christians should be concerned about the topic, including a look at well known 20th century figures that are considered holy elders or saints in the Orthodox Church and their relationship and thoughts about science, contributors analyse the historical contingencies that contribute to the relationship of the Orthodox Church and science both in the past and present. Part II includes critiques of science and considers its limitations and strengths in light of Orthodox understandings of the experience of God and the so called miraculous, together with analysis of two Orthodox figures of the 20th century that were highly critical of science, it's foundations and metaphysical assumptions. Part III looks at selected topics in science and how they relate to Orthodox theology, including evolution, brain evolution and consciousness, beginning of life science, nanotechnology, stem cell research and others. Drawing together leading Orthodox scientists, theologians, and historians confronting some of the critical issues and uses of modern science, this book will be useful for students, academics and clergy who want to develop a greater understanding of how to relate Orthodoxy to science.

People have pondered conflicts between science and religion since at least the time of Christ. The millennia-long debate is well documented in the literature in the history and philosophy of science and religion in Western civilization. Science and Eastern Orthodoxy is a departure from that vast body of work, providing the first general overview of the relationship between science and Christian Orthodoxy, the official church of the Oriental Roman Empire. This pioneering study traces a rich history over an impressive span of time, from Saint Basil’s Hexameron of the fourth century to the globalization of scientific debates in the twentieth century. Efthymios Nicolaidis argues that conflicts between science and Greek Orthodoxy—when they existed—were not science versus Christianity but rather ecclesiastical debates that traversed the whole of society. Nicolaidis explains that during the Byzantine period, the Greek fathers of the church and their Byzantine followers wrestled passionately with how to reconcile their religious beliefs with the pagan science of their ancient ancestors. What, they repeatedly asked, should be the church’s official attitude toward secular knowledge? From the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth century to its dismantling in the nineteenth century, the patriarchate of Constantinople attempted to control the scientific education of its Christian subjects, an effort complicated by the introduction of European science in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Science and Eastern Orthodoxy provides a wealth of new information concerning Orthodoxy and secular knowledge—and the reactions of the Orthodox Church to modern sciences.

In this unique volume, a new and distinctive perspective on hotly debated issues in science and religion emerges from the unlikely ancient Eastern Orthodox Christian tradition. Alexei Nesteruk reveals how the Orthodox tradition, deeply rooted in Greek Patristic thought, can contribute importantly in a way that the usual Western sources do not. Orthodox thought, he holds, profoundly and helpfully relates the experience of God to our knowledge of the world. His masterful historical introduction to the Orthodox traditions not only surveys key features of its theology but highlights its ontology of participation and communion. From this Nesteruk derives Orthodoxy's unique approach to theological and scientific attribution. Theology identifies the underlying principles (logoi) in scientific affirmations. Nesteruk then applies this methodology to key issues in cosmology: the presence of the divine in creation, the theological meaning of models of creation, the problem of time, and the validity of the anthropic principle, especially as it relates to the emergence of humans and the Incarnation. Nesteruk's unique synthesis is not a valorization of Eastern Orthodox thought so much as an influx of startlingly fresh ideas about the character of science itself and an affirmation of the ultimate religious and theological value of the whole scientific enterprise.

This book gives an overview of the relationship between science and Christian Orthodoxy, the official church of the Eastern Roman Empire.

The first volume of the new series Science and the Orthodox Church focuses on the nature of the relationship between modern Science and Orthodox Christianity with its centuries-old tradition. Orthodoxy today shares a variety of--sometimes ambiguous--attitudes towards modern Science shaped by the texts of the Church Fathers, medieval and modern theologians and scholars, as well as contemporary social realities. On the other hand, modern Science, which sprung from the seventeenth-century quest by Western-European philosophers for rationality, is faced with crucial and uneasy questions about the meaning of life and the position of Humankind within the natural world. The main goal of the volume is to define the patterns of the Science-religion relationship in the Orthodox world, especially in the light of the most recent trends in both Science and Theology. Is this a relationship of dialog or conflict? Of integration or independence? What is the impact of the revival of patristic studies and new theological currents on the relationship? But also what is the relevant impact of new scientific discoveries on the image of the Human and the Universe? Has the modern Science-religion dialog in the West influenced Eastern Christianity in its effort to create new perspectives and concepts in response to new challenges? These questions are crucial for understanding and mapping the current science-religion dialog in the Orthodox world, and apart from recording given views and opinions.

It is well known that energy is a fundamental concept in physics. Much less well known is that it is also a key concept in Eastern Christian or Orthodox theology. This book from Dr. Stoyan Tanev—a physicist, innovation management scholar, and theologian—provides a comparative analysis of the conceptualizations of energy in Orthodox theology and in physics, and demonstrates the potential of such comparison for a better understanding of these two quite different domains of human enquiry. The book explores the rediscovery of the Byzantine Church’s teaching on the Divine energies in twentieth-century Orthodox theology, and offers new insights about the key contributions of key theologians such as Sergius Bulgakov, George Florovsky, John Meyendorff, Christos Yannaras, and Thomas Torrance. Where do the understandings of energy in theology and physics meet? The author argues that the encounter between theology and physics happens at the level of quantum physics, where the subtle use of words and language acquires a distinctive apophatic dimension. His comparative approach focuses on the epistemological struggles of theologians and physicists. According to Tanev, this focus on the struggles of knowing offers a new way to look at the dialogue between science and theology.

This book is the first academic work in Eastern Orthodox theological literature on the subject of animal suffering and human soteriology. It represents a natural progression of the contemporary Eastern Orthodox academic debate on the environment, and will be of interest not only to academic scholars in theology, religion, philosophy and ethics, but also to the wider Christian and secular communities. Using Biblical and Patristic teachings, together with new social science research and contemporary science, it presents arguments that animal suffering is against Gods Will, and that the abuse or misuse of animals or indifference to animal suffering will result in negative consequences for human salvation. The book posits a revisionist interpretation of the Noahic narrative when addressing the challenging question of why God allows the dispensation of animals as food, and offers compelling arguments on why the contemporary animal food production industries and animal testing model should be rejected.