"I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener." (NIV, John 15:1)
Throughout the Christian era, people have read the Bible and understood its spiritual, moral and ethical teachings that are sometimes revealed through figurative language. It wasn't until science began to develop in the 16th century that questions and arguments arose about whether all the Bible's stories are also true in a scientific and historical sense.
The first major conflict was between the , as reflected in the Bible, and the Copernican theory, which held that the earth and the other planets revolved around the sun. The astronomer Galileo, using his telescope, found evidence to support the Copernican theory and began publishing his results in 1611. Church officials were alarmed because the Copernican theory seemed to contradict the Bible, and in 1616 Pope Paul V ordered Galileo to abandon the Copernican theory.
By the nineteenth century most Christians had come to accept the Copernican theory because of overwhelming scientific evidence. But a new crisis arose with the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859. Darwin proposed that species of plants and animals evolved through a process of natural selection. Darwin observed that there were variations among individual plants and animals. He proposed that, in the struggle to survive, the better-adapted individuals would be more likely to survive and reproduce their characteristics in succeeding generations. Thus, over many generations, species would change by a process of evolution. Further, the process was said to work automatically, leaving little room for divine guidance or design.
Darwin's theory was widely seen by Christians as a direct attack on the story of creation in the Bible book of Genesis (). It also spawned a number of atheistic movements both within the natural sciences and the social sciences that saw the universe as created and ruled simply by the impersonal forces of nature. "Darwinism" became associated with atheism in the minds of many Christians, and rejection of all of Darwin's theories became almost a creed for many Christians in the early twentieth century.
Today most scientists accept that, contrary to a literal interpretation of the Genesis account of creation, the universe is billions of years old, and that natural selection has played an important role in the development of species over millions of years. However, the excesses of Darwinism have been tempered by subsequent discoveries and second thoughts. Natural selection alone is no longer widely considered to be an adequate explanation for the how and why of all life. It is incredible to believe the immense complexity of life arose by mere chance, even given the long time span. Even if it did, there would remain the ultimate question of how the universe originated and why it is arranged as it is.
By the mid-twentieth century, many Christians had taken a different view of the Bible. Although still believed to be inspired by God, it was not considered an infallible authority on matters of science and history. The Bible was now seen primarily as a book of spiritual and moral guidance. God had inspired its human authors to deliver His message to the world, but had left it up to them to express that message in terms of their own cultures.
In this view, many of the Bible's stories are historically accurate, but some spiritual truths are revealed through the common literary mechanisms of allegory, parable, simile, metaphor, hyperbole, and irony that were never intended to be taken literally. Such mechanisms serve to "paint a mental picture" of ideas not easily expressed directly in words. The Bible reveals timeless spiritual truths about God, love, salvation, faith, morals and ethics that transcend the realms of science and history. We can appreciate the beauty of a sunrise whether or not the sun literally "rises" above the earth. In the same way, we can understand and appreciate the lessons of the Bible whether or not all its stories are true in a literal sense. Trying to force the Bible's stories into a scientific or historical framework debases them and obscures their true meaning and intent.
Christians might have different opinions about whether the bible is literally true because they cant prove that the content that is included in the bible is actually true as the bible was written a very long time ago. Some of the stories about the creation of humans and the formation of the earth seem like they are impossible to be real and Christians may prefer to believe the stories of evolution and the big bang because they seem realistic.
Everyone has different beliefs about the bible and have different opinions about whether it is literally true. They may believe that some parts of the bible is true because it is the word of God but other parts just don’t seem likely that they actually happened
