Customer Reviews

The Beginning of All Things: Science and Religion

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Hans Kung has been a formidable intellect in theology for many years having written over 50 books. His writing is characterized by breadth of learning. His book Infallible? An Enquiry (1978) led to loss of his license to teach theology in Roman Catholic schools but did not discourage him from pushing the theological envelope. For those who regard it as important, Kung's views were never found to be heretical. Now retired from his professorship at Tubingen University, Kung turns his attention in this volume to the question whether science and religion can coexist. His answer is that they do more than coexist; they are complimentary. Kung defines complementarity as a state "between science and religion in which the distinctive spheres are preserved, all illegitimate transitions are avoided and all absolutizations are rejected, but in which in mutual questioning and enrichment people attempt to do justice to reality in all its dimensions."

Kung immediately engages the skeptic's question whether he argues for an unenlightened biblical belief in a being that created the world in six days. Kung replies: "Certainly not! I want to take the Bible seriously, but that doesn't mean I want to take it literally."

Kung begins with an engaging and clear tour through cosmology. He leaves nothing out from Copernicus to Newton, Einstein, Big Bang theory, Heisenberg's indeterminacy and Godel's incompleteness. Kung's point is, not surprisingly, that science cannot account for everything. Kung draws us back to the fundamental questions about the origin of the first structures in the universe. Science may be able to explain the fine tuning of the first structures but the question remains: where did the minimal structure that already existed at the Big Bang come from? Why isn't there nothing? Kung offers God as a reasonable hypothesis that can provide intellectual answers to the questions of the beginning.

In succeeding chapters Kung takes up the debate between creationism and evolution, life in the universe and the development of human beings. He includes discussion of the brain and the mind, the limits of brain research and the beginning of human ethics. Having started with the beginning of all things, his epilogue deals with the end of all things - hypotheses of the end of the universe and apocalyptic visions of the end.

Kung does not set out new theories of science or religion and does not insist on one or the other as the final arbiter of reality (his term). Discussion today, like so much else, tends to polarize between those who view God as irrelevant versus the creationists and the left-behinders. Kung proposes to raise the level of discussion by invoking serious scientists and philosophers. The Beginning of All Things is a good starting point for clear and dispassionate descriptions of the interplay between serious science and serious philosophy/theology about the most intriguing and still unsolved mysteries of the universe and humanity.

Kung is one of the clearest theologians thinkers writing today. There are a glut of books out there promising to weigh in on some pressing issue that concerns the science/ religion controversy. I personally believe that it is a bogus issue largely fed by the publishing industry. That said, I think Kung's book is one of the few on the subject worth reading. I have read Dawkins and Hitchens and am generally sympathetic with their views. But Kung points out that while science (and history) may have much to say about human beings and perhaps what drives religious movements, it has absolutely nothing to say about God. Kung reminds us of the often forgotten distinction between religious experience and religious organizations. This book lays out the fundamental issue more clearly than any I have encountered.

Hans Kung happens to be my favorite theologian. He writes very readable books, epitomizes a huge amount of scholarship, and offers brief and perceptive summaries of points of view hostile to his own. I think this is one of his best books. For all who labor in the vinyards of the conflicts between science and religion, this will be not only a very helpful book, but a very enjoyable one to read.

This was the first Hans Kung book that I have read, and I must say, I am rather impressed with his level of scholarship, clarity of thought, and vast scope of learning. His treatment of the interaction of science and theology was not bad, though I must confess that I did not think he was quite as good at it as Polkinghorne. However, I found that I was very dissapointed with many of the conclusions that Kung reached. In the majority of issues he discusses, he ends up reconsiling science and Christianity by having Christianity give up any claims it has in any area that science touches. Now, I am not advocating a literal six-day creation, or suggesting that we believe that the earth is flat, but I do think he has gone a bit far in denying that miracles happen. Whenever he perceives that Christianity and science can even potentially come into conflict, he always decides that (what he understands to be) science wins.

For example, Scripture claims that Jesus performed miracles. Science tells us (according to Kung) that miracles cannot happen. What should we conclude? Well, according to Kung, we should conclude that the miracles did not happen. You would think that this would effectively undermine Christianity, but Kung tries to defend this position by making the absurd claim that the miracle stories in both the Old and New Testaments were not meant by the authors to be taken literally. It may be that Kung does not take them literally, but it is absolutely absurd to claim that the persons who wrote them, and the persons who originally recieved them, did not think they were to be taken literally. I found his section on miracles (pg. 151ff.) to be absolutely appalling, not because of his denial of miracles (though I do disagree with that), but because he actually tried to claim that this denial was in line with the thinking of the ancient people's who wrote and received the Scriptures. He could at least be honest and face up to the fact that his understanding of the historicity of Scripture is not the same as that of the authors of Scripture.

Further, in his effort to avoid conflict, he banishes Christianity to the sphere of personal preference. He explicitly says that "no religion can dispute with others their way to salvation. Rather it is important in recognition of human freedom, especially the real freedom of faith, for each to respect its own path of faith" (p. 197). Christian teaching is no longer objectively true, but is instead a subjective understanding of the "other," which can neither come into conflict with science and history nor even competing (and logically incompatible) religions. I think his approach to the topic is well summed up in his conclusions about the resurrection, which is central to Christianity. He says that "I do not believe in the later legendary elaborations of the New Testament message of the resurrection but in its original core: that this Jesus of Nazareth did not die into nothingness, but into God" (p. 205).

In short, Kung has a lot of good things to say about the compatibility of science and theism in general. He does a very good job of showing that science has not been, nor can ever be, the cause of the death of God. However, his sections of the relationship of science and Christianity are relatively useless for someone who holds to orthodox Christianity, as he promotes harmony by demolishing the claims of Christianity so that they cannot oppose what he understands to be science. I am emphaticly NOT saying that we should use Scripture as a science textbook, but I think denying both miracles and the historicity of the gospels amounts to denying the truthfulness of anything resembling historical Christianity.

It may seem that I have had little good to say about a book I gave four stars. Let me emphasize that a good portion of this book is actually quite helpful. Those parts have already been written about in the previous reviews here. I simply wished to focus on the parts which previous reviewers have not. This is not a terrible book, as long as you understand what understanding of Christianity Kung is bringing to the table with him. If you disagree (as I do) with his liberal Christianity, then parts of it (the parts which I have mentioned) will be relatively useless and probably aggrivating to you, but there is still a significant amount of good, well thought out work to be had in it.

Overall grade: B.

In this book Kung uses his broad familiarity with modern science to consider how recent findings and theories relate to the question of faith in God. He is particularly good in the area of physics, where he provides a wealth of excerpts from the writings of some of the great physicists of the 20th century as they consider fundamental questions raised by their discoveries. He clearly points out the difference between scientific and religious thinking, not hesitating to reproach religious as well as scientific thinkers for not recognizing the validity of the other's methods and points of view.
Along the way he never hesitates to reproach Church authorities for the methods they have used and unfortunately continue to use in their attempts to maintain orthodoxy. As a Catholic scientist I find his tone somewhat harsh in this regard, but I support his steadfast refusal to accept their disciplinary procedures in his uphill attempts at making the faith comprehensible to modern men and women. He is definitely ahead of the curve and this makes for controversy.
It is important to point out that in spite of his left-of-center theological opinions he remains a priest in good standing and is held in respect by his former colleague and friend from Tübingen, the current pope, Benedict XVI. In fact in the fall of 2005 he had a friendly dinner and extended conversation with the pope, on which occasion he presented him with a copy of this book and received the pope's appreciation for his efforts in promoting dialog between science and religion.
Some of the questions covered in the book are: what is the nature of reality; what came before the big bang; what does religion mean by creation; is there a role for empirical science in the question of God; how did life originate; how did humans come to be; what is the relationship between the brain and consciousness; and many other flash points in the contemporary exchanges between science and religion.
He concludes his book with a magnificent description of the end of life as not dying into nothingness, as many in modern science would have it, but rather as dying into the ultimate reality we call God. To quote him: "dying is a farewell inward, an entry and homecoming into the ground and origin of the world...dying into the light."
A beautiful book!

First, my bias - Hans Kung is a genius. I have read the majority of his works and find them all to be great. I have often said that I am still a Catholic because him. For those of you not in the know, Hans is a Catholic and a theologian, but cannot call himself a Catholic Theologian. If this last sentence makes sense to you, than this book is for you.

I read this directly after reading Dinesh D'Sousza What's So Great about Christianity. While many of their point are similar Kung has a much deeper understanding of the subtleties. It is not an easy a read as D'Sousza (I think this is probably due to the fact that is a translation), but it gives you a deeper understanding of the concepts. His argument that is it bizarre that scientist see no problem in the duality of light (wave/particle), yet squawk of the notion of the duality of Christ is sheer genius.

Hans Küng's THE BEGINNING OF ALL THINGS is a superb essay on the reasonableness of the concept of God in the face of modern scientific discovery. It was not, apparently, written as a response to any of the seemingly proliferating neo-atheist books that have dominated the market of late, though it would be a smart rejoinder.

Küng is a brilliant thinker, gifted with the ability not only to absorb but also to explain often exceedingly difficult philosophical, scientific and mathematical concepts. This present book largely focuses on scientific and theological beginnings, running the gamut to include the Big Bang, Genesis, the origin of life, evolution, the emergence of humans, and the existence (or not) of free will. Küng freely accepts the scientifically and rationally proven, and is open to grappling with scientific hypotheses that attempt to explain other problems or phenomena. A scientifically enlightened man, if also a religious one, he accepts the Big Bang and evolution, and after presenting the opposing views on free will, ultimately rejects as unproven theories that suggest free will is an illusion. He demands, in return, that one look upon the problem of the existence of God from an equally rational stance.

Küng goes beyond Blaise Pascal's "wager," which stated, essentially, that if one cannot know whether or not God exists one might as well accept God's existence because it can't hurt. Küng wholly embraces God because God, for Küng, gives meaning to what's otherwise void and nothingness, to a universe that inexplicably burst into being, expands, gives impetus to life and consciousness and which will then, eventually, either collapse into itself or continue to expand and eventually flicker out. Küng asserts that he believes in God "not on the basis of a calculation of probability or mathematical logic but out of a rational trust" (p. 205).

With respect to being a Christian, Küng, a Catholic priest and controversial theologian, notes that he does not believe in the "later legendary elaborations" of the Resurrection, but that "Jesus of Nazareth did not die into nothingness, but into God" (p. 205). (This is a clearer articulation of his views on the Resurrection than what I found in ON BEING A CHRISTIAN, in which his views seemed calculatedly more opaque.) His final hope is that he, too, like Jesus, will "die into the ultimate reality, into God" (p. 205).

Küng's insistence on holding the light of reason up to every aspect of science and religion will not be a comfort to many Christians. Küng rejects a literal embracing of those aspects of the Judeo-Christian tradition that appear to defy the physical laws of the universe, e.g., the many miracle stories, which he reads--under the light of literary criticism--as explaining the working of God in the world through people. He also casts aside a *merely* anthropomorphic view of God, explaining that God is *more* than a person--but not less than one, either (pp. 107-108). On the other hand, Küng does not see God as simply the Unmoved Mover; rather, God both transcends the world, and is immanent is in it (p. 106), God can be addressed (p. 117), and God creates, sustains and works on the world from within (pp. 124, 156).

Those who may have been intimidated by Küng's tomes, ON BEING A CHRISTIAN and DOES GOD EXIST? should be reassured that, despite the occasionally difficult scientific concept, THE BEGINNING OF ALL THINGS is very accessible and, moreover, comes in at fewer than 210 pages. It is probably the most important book I've read in some time, and I found much to be edified by in it.

"The reason of natural science can enter into a discussion with faith. Faith, as Pascal said, has its reasons that reason doesn't know. God is not a category for science, but there is room for faith in divine creation. Let us Not Preach to the Scientists. A theologian should not cast doubt on a scientific consensus, but should see how he can deal with it." Hans Küng.



Evolution vs intelligent design:
Conservative voices have dominated the theologian's defense of God's active role in evolution and/or creation of the species, in debates over evolution versus intelligent design. Last year, the eminent Hans Küng, one of the Roman Catholics leading theologian has published a study that tolerates evolution, as scientists would describe it, while still maintaining a role for God, describing God's activity not on the side of intelligent design supporters, as the designer of complex forms of life, but as the founder of the laws of nature by which life evolved, (e.g. beyond Samuel Alexander's 'Space, Time and Deity). Küng has little patience either for scientists who are myopic beyond the limits of their disciplines, or for theologians who try to tell the scientists how things must have come to be, in elaborating the adventure of creation. He masterfully concludes, "I understand the views of the agnostics and atheists. But I also see the questions that agnosticism can't and doesn't want to answer. I can fully understand those who want to have a basis in faith but think that a fundamentalism that takes the Bible literally does justice neither to the Bible nor to today's people. We can reach what I would call a reasonable middle position. ... These court cases over evolution are counterproductive. They damage religion and don't help at all."

Has God intervened in Crevolution?
An intervention is usually something violent or aggressive, 'though' religion can interpret evolution as creation" What Kung attempted to reject is the concept of Divine intervention against the laws of nature, whom he has perfected. "I would even go further and say that for science, God is not a category because God by definition is a reality beyond time and space, and therefore does not belong in the world of our scientific experience. But there are questions that science cannot answer. The fundamental question of philosophy, according to Leibnitz, is "why is there anything at all and not simply nothing?" Science can't answer that," articulates Hans Kung in a recent telephone interview.
Eminent Cardinal Schönborn has entered the evolution debate to counter what the Pope regards as the growing influence of materialist thinking. Kung agrees that materialism is a primitive world view, even if it is presented in a scientific way. But, even though, it's not viable to try to prove religious doctrines to scientists. "It is a gigantic achievement of humanity that, at the end of a process of 13.7 billion years, there are small beings who are the first, as far as we know, who try to understand all this. If I am a believer, science can explain the process of creation in a completely different and magnificent way than the Genesis interpretation that it all happened in six days.

What is man?
That is the big question of the anthropic principle. The latest research shows, as far as we can see, there is no life elsewhere in the universe. We are probably alone. How curious that we are on a completely secondary star of a Milky Way that is one of hundred thousand galaxies! A religious person can say that creation obviously has a goal. But that is a religious statement. We shouldn't talk of intelligent design. That we have emerged is a product of necessity and chance. Creation is a concept that explains the beginning of things but is also the continuing process of life. So we can interpret evolution as creation, but I do that as a believer, not as a scientist. Religion classes in Europpean schools are much more sophisticated. Biology classes are also better here. Another thing we don't have in Europe is, as in America, teachers who are afraid to teach these biological facts because some parents could make a big fuss. And yet the scientist can get a different picture of reality when he admits, "There is more between heaven and earth than is dreamt of in your philosophy," as Shakespeare put it. You can't reduce music just to physics and mathematics, says Kung."

The personal image of God:
Kung does not want to get away from it, but rephrasing the question scientifically, he can't ask about God the Father. "In scientific terms, that is absurd. The symbol of the father certainly has a function and when I read the Bible, I have no problems with that. The fundamental cause of the world is God. But I can also say Our Father. So when he was asked, Why do you say in your book that man is not the crown of creation? He explained," 'Crown' sounds too much like self-coronation, as if we were the final product.... It's enough to say we are the preliminary final product."
Kung prefers to speak about the constants in nature, "Take the speed of light. Why has it been there from the start? You have to ask: where did it come from? How did matter develop and not just stay as gas? Astrophysicists can only go back to just after the Big Bang. I have to go beyond time and space, and there we can say, "I don't know." We should not speak too quickly of God in an anthropomorphic sense. Matter needs constants in the beginning, confirms Kung, it needs some mass and an initial energy! "Where does it get that from? This initial energy works according to certain cosmic natural constants and they are givens. They were not newly invented or introduced at any time. No biologist would say there is a need of an intervention or organizer so that life emerges from non-life. But what holds it all together and makes it work? Where does it all come from? Why doesn't it all fall apart? Those are the big questions that a scientist can't answer. As soon as one tries to intellectually force scientists to recognize God, one is on the wrong track.

Hans Kung:
A prolific author, and bold thinker who fell out of favor of the Vatican curia in 1979. The Swiss-born Roman Catholic theologian, license to teach Catholic theology was revoked in 1979 having challenged the doctrine of papal infallibility. But when Joseph Ratzinger, Küng's former colleague from the Tübingen University theology faculty in Germany, was elected Pope Benedict XVI last April, the mood changed. Even though the pope is unmistakably conservative, he invited his rebellious old colleague to a friendly dinner. Among the topics they discussed was Küng's new book on evolution, "The Beginning of All Things".

I tend to read in threes, and this is the deeper and more complex of the three. The first, the one I gave 6+ stars to for its simplicity and coherence, was God and Science: Coming Full Circle?. The second--and also recommended as the second to buy and read if you do two-- was Questions of Truth: Fifty-one Responses to Questions About God, Science, and Belief. The latter, by John Polkinghorne, perhaps the most prolific and qualified of authors on the subject of science and religion, is with Hans Kung a Nobel-level contributor.

My reading of this book certainly benefitted from the reading of the other two first. This is more of a graduate-level book, and the references to many other authors and works "in passing," as if one were already familiar with them, makes this book one best appreciated by those who have invested time in the topic and the related writings by others.

The book opens elegantly, observing that "let there be light" is a phrase equally applicable to religion and to science, going on to assert that to attempt any unification of knowledge, one needs both philosophy and theology.

The author laments that cosmology, biology, and anthropology are now so complex that it is almost impossible for someone from outside a discipline to understand the discipline in detail, and he argues for the need for focused generalists who seek to connect and unify knowledge. Certainly knowledge has become so fragmented that much of it is useless to the direct needs of humanity, visit Maps of Science on the Internet, where Dick Klavans and others have shown the stark isolation of the sciences and humanities from one another.

Interestingly for me the author explores the meaning of the word "cosmos" as referring to an ordered whole, while universe means "turned into one." In the context of the complexities of all that we do not know, the words seem far distant goals for human understanding, but one must take on faith their reality.

It is at this point that I have my own crude Latin expression, "Connexum Sumus Unum," Connected We Are One, and I reflect on the reality that both science and religion have the capacity to connect us all (but also the capacity to destroy us all).

Distinctly from the other two books in this series, the author focuses upon and naturally excels at examining how individuals such as Copernicus led to paradigm shifts in human understanding, and he equally excels at holding the Catholic Church generally and the Pope of the day specifically, accountable for false judgments. One of the things I have always admired about Hans Kung has been his constancy wrapped in integrity. I share with him the view that the Church should pursue liberation theology (which today I would suggest should be entwined with liberation technology), and I certainly share his view that the Church has much to atone for and can do so much more. I have little faith that forthcoming Assisi Peace Summit (October 2011) will produce anything substantial despite an earnest effort by Pope Benedict XVI, for the simple reason that the Church as an institution appears comatose, represented by Nuncios who are not at all eager to engage with science or reality or human need. My letter to the Pope, ignored by Nuncios and the Papal Household alike, can be found at tiny url /Assisi-Intelligence.

The author cites Thomas Kuhn on paradigm changes, and I record the citation here, a paradigm being "the entire constellation of beliefs, values, techniques, and so on shared by the members of a given community."

The author is brutally honest in outlining how Copernicus and then Gallileo caused the Catholic Church to impose censorship, indexing (forbidden knowledge) and the tortures of the inquisition, instead of "intellectual understanding, effort, and acceptance." The author is explicit in pointing to the case of Gallileo as a classic false judgment by the Holy Office, and I for one can only agree with him in his long-standing views that Pope's are human and fallible; that the Catholic Church is an institution and fallible.

The author observes that the cost of the Churches repression was the non-existence of science in Italy and Spain until the 20th Century.

Overall the beginning of the book is a superb summary of the history of paradigm shifting science up to Hubble's work showing extra-gallactic gallaxies.

The author's treatment of Hawking's is direct: he has failed to provide a unified theory that supplants God; but also sympathetic, crediting Hawkings with recognizing that "our search for understanding will never come to an end."

For me a core concept in this book that is not in the other two is the author's focus on the core common ground between science and religion being that neither can prove all statement to be true (not just that they both seek the truth, but that sometimes the truth can be known but not proven).

QUOTE (32): "In the world reality is especially human beings, human beings of all levels and classes, all colors and race, nations and regions, the individual and society--the greatness and misery of the human race."

I have a note, so very pertinent to my last 20 years of fighting for "smart nation" but explicitly addressed by the author in his discussion of "reality": Reality is multi-dimensional--nuanced--multi-disciplinary. What this MEANS is that no one nation, class, race, religion, or any discipline can know the truth--it takes ALL OF US to know the truth.

The author favors--and documents the vitality of his view--a model of complementarity between science and religion, not only eschewing confrontation, but ALSO eschewing integration. Each has distinct strengths. Neither can supplant the other.

He observes that reason, but not reason alone, is essential. Objectivity is NOT identical to "the truth," that requires the finesse of spirituality. The "truth" requires all that theology and philosophy can offer in the was of first meanings, aims, values, ideals, norms, decisions, and attitudes. I am reminded more than once of Will and Ariel Durant's life work but especially his first and their last work:

Philosophy and the Social Problem: The Annotated Edition
The Lessons of History

To my surprise, he identifies Ken Wilbur's The Marriage of Sense and Soul: Integrating Science and Religion as a kindred spirit work, while noting that E. O. Wilson's triumphant work (in my own view), Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge stands apart, which I take to be a polite isolation as insufficiently respectful of the holy or the spiritual as distinct from the humanities.

I have a note, based on my decade of study of the emerging collective intelligence/autonomous internet movements, that we are entering a new world in which either/or, an industrial era concept, is no longer applicable nor acceptable. "Some of each, some of all" is now the operative norm.

The entire book can be seen as an advanced introduction to the relevance of metaphysics as a meeting ground for science and religion, and I find the author's coverage of quantum mechanics, multiple universes, and the possibilities of extra-terrestial intelligence to be distinct from and complementary to the same topics covered in different ways by the other two books in this series.

The author clearly holds John Archibald Wheeler, author of At Home in the Universe (Masters of Modern Physics) among other works, in very high regard. He discusses Wheeler's contribution to the dialog on "it from bit", i.e. how does "it" (the world) come into being from a substratum of "bit" (information). This all argues for a metaphysics of creation.

The author points out that ignorance grows with knowledge. Here again I see the percentages the other two books also cited: 4% known matter, the universe we know; 23% dark matter, 73% dark energy.

Next up the author discusses Darwin, observing that the Church rejected Darwin, and that as late as 1950 the Church prevaricated on evolution. The Church clearly shares with US Southern fundamentalist creationists (the source of Koran burning, a dark stain on US honor) some deep moral and intellectual shortcomings. The author observes that fundamentalists today include Catholic and Protestant Christians and Jews, he does not mention Muslims that I notice.

I learn about Pierre Tielhard de Chardin, and must confess that only now in my middle age (58) am I starting to see both the value of my earlier education and all that I missed the first time around. The Church destroyed the conceptualizer of the noosphere whose focus was on harmonizing science and theology, and in so doing--my view--the Church set humanity back at least a century. The author tells us that in addition to forbidding Tielhard's books in libraries or in translation, that no Pope has spoken Pierre Tielhard de Chardin's name.

QUOTE (97): In Tielhard's view of the world, human beings, too, are not yet complete. They are coming into being; becoming human, anthropogenesis, is not yet complete. It presses on toward Christogenesis, and Christogenesis finally presses onward toward its future fullness...."

Bottom line: the noosphere is when man as the collective comes together is such cosmic harmony as to be one with God--the universal cosmic Christ.

He follows this with a review of Alfred North Whitehead, and I cannot help but see this book as a cornerstone for an advanced course on science and theology, its intellectual underpinnings.

The author emphasizes that God is in the process, not the matter, and here I conceptualize the Yin and Yang of science (the hard) and religion (the soft, or the space between).

Citing Process and Reality by Alfred North Whitehead, "In the 'end' God is the realization of the actual world in the unity of nature."

QUOTE (107): "We can formulate the relationship between God and the world, God and human beings, only dialectically" God is transcendence, but in immanence. He is an eternity, but in temporality; immeasurability, but in space. So God is the absolute in the relative, the primal mystery in the reality of the world and world history--no more detectable than the arhcitectural formula that supports everything in the bridge that spans the abyss."

The author the goes on to review the creation myths of the various other religions, before engaging in Chapter 4 with the question of "what is life?" Life is reproduction, mutation, and metabolism.

The author is dubious of the possibility of extra-terrestial life (on this I disagree completely). He discusses the history of life and religion, citing others as humanity moves from magic to religion to science

The author concludes with what for me are three truly fundamental points:

01 We know so little, we have the potential to know so much more

02 Ethics is the essence of humanity maturing

03 We will die into the light--death is our resurrection in being with Christ and community and "all."

"Now one of Catholicism's leading liberals, theologian Hans Küng, has come out with a book that accepts evolution as scientists generally describe it but still maintains a role for God... Küng has little patience either for scientists who do not see beyond the limits of their discipline or for believers who try to tell the experts how things must have been." Tom Heneghan



Common Grounds of Science & Theology:
At no time, for almost fifteen centuries, has the opportunity for genuine theology been greater, since the ground has been cleared in the remarkable way of the old dualist and atomistic modes of thought that have plagued theology for centuries. It is, therefore, up to theologians like hans Kung and Thomas Torrance to develop theology on its own proper ground in this scientific context, because this is the kind of life and culture, and theology that can support the true message of the Gospel to mankind. Being in touch with the advances of natural science, theology comes close to an enlightened conception of the creation as an act of inspired 'Intelligent Design'.

Beginnings of time, Cosmos & Man:
Focusing on beginnings, beginnings of time, of the world, of man, of human will, Kung deals with an array of scientific precepts and teachings. From a unified field theory to quantum physics to the Big Bang to the theory of relativity, even superstring and chaos theories, he examines all of the theories regarding the beginning of the universe and life (of all kinds) in that universe. Kung seeks to reconcile theology with the latest scientific insights, holding that "a confrontational model for the relationship between science and theology is out of date, whether put forward by fundamentalist believers and theologians or by rationalistic scientists and philosophers." While accepting evolution as scientists generally describe it, he still maintains a role for God in founding the laws of nature by which life evolved and in facilitating the adventure of creation.

Kung Theology & Kuhn's Paradigms:
Kuhn's paradigm theory is widely known and used. Its origins are in the history and philosophy of science, but its more recent applications have been in numerous fields including theology. The view that there are multiple realities, viewpoints, or paradigms, has been a dominant one since the demise of empiricism. The paradigms view asserts that theories are comprehensive interpretative frameworks that structure human experience and understanding of self and world. Like a language, each theory is said to provide a framework, incommensurable to others, through which its adherents interpret experience.
"If normal science is rigid and uncritical, then revolutionary science is even more so, although for different reasons. Kuhn describes the debate during crises as being at best "partial" and at "cross purposes," for in a world of incommensurable paradigm contenders persuasion and a subsequent 'gestalt switch' or conversion are the only means of deciding for or against a paradigm candidate ... In adopting Thomas Kuhn's paradigm theory, Hans Kung also engages its wider implications. Yet, these produce some uncomfortable dilemmas for his theology and at times even conflict with his wider thought. ... to identify some of the controversies and explores some of the issues that arise, in particular those associated with the conflict presented between the educational theory advocated by Kuhn and that contained in Kung's wider thinking. The dilemma cannot be easily resolved, and paradigm theory does not offer an appropriate solution. Indeed, it presents some major ironies for Kung that he must somehow resolve." Erich von Dietze

Book Review:
Kung, whose intellect could only be compared to Barth and Hans von Balthasar, never referred to the Anglican master of this book domain, Thomas Torrance, par excellence the dean of the school of scientific Theology. Great Kung has thus missed the one who initiated such genius approach, John Philoponus, seventh century dean of the Alexandrine academy, and the Emperor's arbiter, who dismantled Aristotelian physics, was guide to Galileo and Thomas Aquinas, who studied his philosophical commentaries and used his notes!

Eminent Hans Küng:
A prolific author, now 78, was out of favor for decades with Roman Curia. The Swiss-born priest, was stripped of his license to teach Catholic theology in 1979 since he challenged the doctrine of papal infallibility. But when Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Küng's former colleague in Tübingen University theology faculty in Germany, was elected Pope Benedict XVI the mood changed, even if slightly, due partly to this Kung's Gem.