What the Bleep Do We Know!?

As a Christian, there are two ways to react to a book like this.

One can be put off by the often obvious “We can be as gods” new age/eastern religion philosophy that seems to run as a subtheme throughout the book, often masquerading as “a new way of thinking.” Or one can be surprised and encouraged by some of the many possible hidden truths which the authors suggest, recognizing that their discoveries are entirely consistent with what Christians have long believed about the relationship between the physical and spiritual dimensions of reality.

It is an intriguing book from both vantage points.

The authors argue that scientific dogmatism and religious dogmatism have taken turns stifling each other’s work - giving rise to an unnecessary and harmful hostility between the two. It is now time to recognize that the physical world and the spiritual world intersect to such an extent that the paranormal is just as real as the normal. Examples of this are found throughout the book, making for some fascinating reading.

Unfortunately, the book sometimes seems to devolve into just another “power of positive thinking” self-help, “change your paradigm” sermon, dressed up in a blend of spiritual and scientific garb. This, however, is not without value. I think there are some important truths in their particular version of positive thinking, as they explore the actual power of faith, the subconscious connections between people (even in different times and places), and the ultimate importance of a reality that we do not see.

All these are basic ideas consistent with a Christian worldview, though the centrality of Christ as a unifying figure is obviously missing.

I learned some new things reading this book. Not necessarily a new philosophy of “doing life”, but a new appreciation for the way science is apparently expanding its investigation into the non-physiscal universe. It is interesting to note that not all scientists fall into the traditional categories of evolutionist or creationist thinking - presupposing the non-existence or existence of God. Some remain open to either possibility. And this apparently opens up whole new dimensions of experimentation and investigation.

I doubt that science will necessarily discover God or prove His existence to anyone’s satisfaction. God seems to want to reserve this task to himself. But the persistent yearning of the human spirit to know more and more (whether good, bad or sometimes ugly), comes through loud and clear in this book. And there is a certain intellectual humility evident in the title that carries throughout the book.

It is most certainly true that we know less than we think we know.

Barren Rocks and Smiling Cornfields

There seems no question that, if God exists, then Nature itself is certainly one of the revelations of God. To be sure, man has instinctively sought God in Nature more than anywhere else. Whether through pantheistic worship, Thoreau-like contemplation, or even agnostic science - we look for God (or to be god) through understanding the majesty and mystery of the natural world.

But, as Andrew Jukes points out, the revelation of God in Nature is veiled and hidden - just as he is veiled in Jesus and Scripture. Nature contains the same kind of inherent inconsistencies, such that one can be led to question whether, in fact, the Natural world was indeed the work of a single God. Or was it, after all, a result of mere chance - or, worse, the handiwork of competing gods?

Andrew Jukes goes so far as to suggest that Nature seems to misrepresent God, saying,

“Does it not seem also to contradict itself, with force against force, heat against cold, darkness against light, death against life, its very elements in ceaseless strife everywhere? On one side showing a preserver, on the other a destroyer; here boundless provision for the support of life; there death reigning. Are there not here exactly the same contradictions and the same difficulties which we find in Scripture? Either therefore we must say, Nature is an inconsistent and lying book, and therefore we will not believe the testimony either of its barren rocks or smiling cornfields; or else we must confess some veil or riddle here.” (Restitution of All Things, p 10)

The history of science demonstrates that the reality of nature is indeed veiled, containing hidden contradictions that conceal the truth of it. The classic example of this is the rising and setting sun, whose movement was obvious to all for thousands of years. And yet it took a higher faculty to reveal that the sun does not move. Or does it? We still speak of the rising and setting sun. This is what most of us non-scientists can actually see and know, though we also know (by faith?) a contradictory truth - that it neither rises nor sets.

Such a paradox (now apparently resolved) is but one of many in Nature. The discovery of such a grand contradiction does not cause scientists to give up on science, declare Truth unattainable, and reject the natural world as some kind of fantasy. Dare I say, in their persistence to continually seek the truth about the physical world, they are an example to all of us who seek the truth about God

We are all dealing with revelations of a God hidden by the same veil. And yet this is a God who makes Himself known, in His good time and manner. The difference between the scientist and the theologian is that the scientist has limited himself to a single revelation. The theologian has more than one. But all the revelations are under the same veil.

The veil often frustrates me. But it teaches me that God himself decides when, where and how He will be found. That is part of what makes him God (and me not so much).

Maybe that's the point of the veil.