:Galileo, Bellarmino and the Bible: Including a Translation of Foscarini's "Letter on the Motion of the Earth."

Abstract

Described as the paradigm case of the troubled interaction between science and religion, the conflict between Galileo and the Church continues to generate new research and debate. Richard J.Blackwell here offers his own approach to the Galileo case using as his primary focus the biblical and ecclesiastical issues that were the battleground for the confrontation. Blackwell's research in the Vatican manuscript collection and the Jesuit archives in Rome enables him to recreate a picture of the trends and countertrends that influenced leading Catholic thinkers of the period: the conservative reaction to the Reformation, the role of the authority in biblical exegesis and in guarding orthodoxy from the inroads of unbridled spirits and the position taken by Cardinal Bellarmine and the Jesuits in attempting to weigh the discoveries of the new science in the context of traditional philosophy and theology. A centrepiece of Blackwell's investigation is his reading of the brief treatise Letter on the Motion of the Earth by Paolo Antonio Foscarini, a Carmelite scholar, arguing for the compatability of the Copernican system with the Bible. Blackwell appends the first modern translation in English of this relatively neglected document, which was placed on the Index of Forbidden Books in 1616. Though there were differing and competing theories of biblical interpretation advocated in Galileo's time, the legacy of the Council of Trent, the views of Cardinal Bellarmine, one of the most influential churchmen of his time, and, finally, the claims of authority and obedience that weakened the ability of Jesuit scientists to support the new science, all contributed to the eventual condemnation of Galileo in 1633. Blackwell argues that the maintenance of ecclesiastical authority, not the scientific issues themselves, led to that trial.