Chapter Eleven. The Problem Of Faith And Scientific Knowledge In Russian Religious Thought Of The Nineteenth–Twentieth Centuries

Abstract

This chapter reviews the main ideas and figures which have contributed directly and indirectly to discussions about scientific knowledge and faith in pre-Revolutionary Russia, as well as in the later Russian Orthodox diaspora. In conducting this research the chapter made two claims concerning the distinctiveness of the Orthodox approach to the biblical interpretation of nature, as well as concerning the appropriation of scientific views of nature by the Orthodox Church and its theology. In discussing the cosmological construct of the so-called Big Bang, which is most commonly associated with the ?beginning? of our visible universe, certain ?point of creation,? Bishop Basil correctly points to the boundaries of the applicability of scientific knowledge of this extraordinary ?event? in the life of the universe. Thus far our analysis of the problem of faith and knowledge in Russian religious philosophy has not considered apologetic works. Keywords: apologetic works; Bishop Basil; faith; religious philosophy; Russian orthodox theology; scientific knowledge