THE AMBIVALENCE OF SCIENTIFIC NATURALISM: A RESPONSE TO MARK HARRIS

Abstract

AbstractResponding to Mark Harris, I reflect on his tantalizing question whether the provision of naturalistic explanations for biblical miracles renders the narratives more, or less, credible. I address his “reversal,” in which professional scientists now feature among defenders of a literalistic reading, while professional biblical scholars are often skeptical. I suggest this underlines the ambivalence of scientific naturalism from the standpoint of Christian theology. Historical examples are adduced to show that, until the mid‐nineteenth century, naturalistic and theistic explanations were commonly regarded as complementary. Accordingly, the primacy often accorded to scientific progress in accounts of secularization is questionable. Two concluding questions are raised. If a methodological naturalism inheres in biblical scholarship, as in the sciences, how do biblical scholars decide whether the historical trajectories they construct for the composition of biblical texts are destructive or affirmative of faith? Second, when the miracle is the Resurrection of the dead Christ, does not the scientific impossibility of this foundational event remain sacrosanct?