This means that the man who is truly scientific will never interpret discoveries in the natural realm in such a way as to deny or even throw doubt upon those fundamental truths in the spiritual realm which have been forever secured by scientific demonstration. In other words, he will not seek to bring the Bible into harmony with man’s interpretation of scientific facts, but he will seek to bring every scientific discovery into harmony with the Bible, withholding final conclusions from all discoveries that will not so harmonize until he has light enough so they will.
We have now reached the point where we can sum up all the requirements which the really scientific man will meet in order that he may be able to proceed with scientific accuracy in his researches in the realms of truth. He will separate the natural and the spiritual realms of truth from each other. He will investigate natural truth with the intellect and spiritual truth with faith. He will distinguish truth that can be demonstrated to the experience from that which must be accepted on testimony alone. And he will accord primacy to the spiritual realm over the natural.
It only remains to be said that the man who will not meet these requirements is a total stranger to the [p 55] scientific spirit. “The Standard Dictionary” says that science is “knowledge gained and verified by exact observation and correct thinking,” and the man who will not meet requirements that are absolutely necessary for exact observation and correct thinking in the gaining and verifying of knowledge does not have the first qualification of the scientific investigator. For he is really not open to truth at all, and is therefore in no position to maintain either the unity between the realms of truth or the primacy of primary truth, and exact observation and correct thinking are out of the question under such conditions. He cannot verify anything with scientific accuracy when he will not even classify the different realms of truth and the faculties of investigation, or give the realms their respective places in the sphere of truth. And so it is futile for one who refuses to do this to talk about being in harmony with the scientific spirit.
When an investigator meets these requirements, on the other hand, he is then ready to meet the next demand made upon the scientific inquirer, which is—
II. Truth Must Be Investigated Scientifically.
Accepting the self-evident accuracy of the classification we have just outlined, we will now give attention to what the scientific spirit will require of us at those two places where the Church and the Schools have parted company. For if we can get together here, we can both proceed and arrive together in our investigation of truth, and that will end the controversy.
[p 56] 1. Faith Must Be Given Precedence over Reason.
Let us see what it will mean to give precedence to faith over reason when we are working in the realm of spiritual truth.
It will mean that believing will precede reasoning in our approach to the Word of God, and this defines the vital distinction between the true Christian and the rationalist.