“The only thing I know is that I know nothing.” –Socrates
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy.”–Hamlet
“I know nothing, nothing.” Sgt Schultz of Hogan’s Heroes
Every now and then a development come along which shakes up our smugness. The discovery of the Americas did this to sixteenth century Europe and, eventually, so did the discoveries of Copernicus and Galileo. So did geologist Charles Lyell in the 1830's who argued that earth was much older than the Seventeenth Century Bishop Ussher’s scripture-based determination that the earth’s creation had occurred on Sunday October 23, 4004.B.C. And let’s not get started on Charles Darwin!
Have you heard of Kepler 10C? This planet was recently discovered using the Hubble. Wags are calling it “The Godzilla Earth.” It’s 17 times the mass of Earth and it’s rocky. Current theory holds that planets with this much mass must be gaseous. Oops! And not only that. Its solar system formed 11 billion years ago, three billion years after the Big Bang. (For comparison, it’s estimated that our Earth formed about 4 billion years ago.) Current theory says that rocky planets could not form that soon after the Big Bang. “This is a planet that doesn’t fit the usual models of planetary formation,” commented Xavier Dumusque of the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, in the understatement of the year (so far!)
Of course, science proceeds by discarding outmoded theories contradicted by new facts. This piece is not about mocking science. But it is about our human tendency to think that we know.
For the last month I have been in a lively discussion via FACEBOOK with an alumnus of some thirty years ago. He takes a rationalist/atheist position, essentially based upon his belief that no compassionate, supremely loving God could allow the suffering which exists in our world. To my mind, this humanist position speaks volumes about a person’s Promethean outrage at perceived injustice and, as a spiritual director, I can work with that. The point I recently made with my correspondent follows.
“I suspect that part of the problem here is that God is construed as being human-like in how he is, particularly in how he loves and how he exercises his omnipotence. So, we humans implicitly say, ‘Well, if I were God, then I would make myself obvious to people and I would abolish all suffering.’ Perhaps a chimpanzee equally might say, ‘If I were human, well there'd be no meat eaten, just bananas.’"
This tendency to put God in a human-defined box is not exclusive to atheists. For example, some of my evangelical friends believe that the fossil record was put there by God in order to test our faith in the Genesis account. Similarly, I admit that I have trouble understanding how God could demand that Abraham sacrifice Isaac. The Lord says, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.” (Is.55:8) But how can we accept a God who, at times, seems to defy rationality?
I think that the first step is humility. When Socrates said he knew nothing he was making the point that when people think they know, they become closed to learning. After all, the only real Knower is God. All other knowledge is derivative and contingent. When Jesus told us to call God “Father” perhaps he was reminding us that our children’s perspective is limited and that we need to trust that our Father does indeed know best.
Also important is to recognize the limits to reason. I made this point with my atheist alumnus.
“But I suggest that there is plenty of human endeavour and human interest in matters not well suited to this sort of analysis. I mean, would you really mock John Keats because figures on an urn are not really “frozen” there? Or would you smirk at Bob Dylan because the times don’t really change? Would you do a cost/benefit analysis of caring for your child?”
Certainly human reason can be a powerful force for good. But unless it is informed by faith and tempered by a tender heart, it can lead us down dangerous paths, perhaps towards Nazi medical experiments or other horrors.
Finally, being more childlike is a great antidote to pride. “You did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption through which we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’” (Rm.8:15) Children play. Children laugh. Children are not surprised when they are wrong. Children learn. Children grow. And while children take many matters seriously, like fairness and rightness, rarely do they take themselves seriously. They leave that to adults.
I conclude with a comment from G.K. Chesterton, that grown-up child who had one of the sanest minds of the twentieth century. In his magisterially delightful book Orthodoxy he comments, “The romantic seeks only to get his head into the heavens. The rationalist seeks to get the heavens into his head—and it is his head that splits.”