When It Touches On Science the Bible Is Scientific

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”​—Gen. 1:1. The book “God and the Astronomers,” page 14, said: “Now we see how the astronomical evidence leads to a biblical view of the origin of the world.”

“He is . . . hanging the earth upon nothing.”​—Job 26:7. The Egyptians said it was supported by pillars; the Greeks said by Atlas; others said by an elephant standing on a turtle that swam in a cosmic sea. But the book of Job, 15th century B.C.E., was scientifically correct.

In the eighth century B.C.E., Isaiah wrote of Jehovah “dwelling above the circle of the earth.” The Hebrew “hhug,” translated “circle,” can also mean “sphere,” as Davidson’s “Concordance” and Wilson’s “Old Testament Word Studies” show. Hence, Moffatt’s translation of Isaiah 40:22 reads: “He sits over the round earth.”

The Bible states: “Star differs from star in glory.” Science now knows that there are blue stars, yellow ones, white dwarfs and many other differences.​—1 Cor. 15:41.

Centuries before naturalists were aware of migration, Jeremiah wrote (seventh century B.C.E.): “The stork in the sky knows the time to migrate, the dove and the swift and the wryneck know the season of return.”​—Jer. 8:7, “The New English Bible.”

A thousand years before Christ, Solomon wrote in figurative language about the circulation of the blood. (Eccl. 12:6) Medical science did not understand it until Dr. Harvey’s studies in the 15th century after Christ.

The Mosaic law (16th century B.C.E.) reflected awareness of disease germs thousands of years before Pasteur. That law contained ordinances to protect against contagion.​—Lev., chaps. 13, 14.

In 1907 medical science discovered that rodents caused plague. During a plague, 1 Samuel 6:5 spoke of “the rats which are ravaging the land.” (“NEB”) This was in the 11th century B.C.E.

The creation account of Genesis is accurate biology​—testified to by the fossil record and modern genetics—​when it says each family kind was to reproduce “according to its kind.”​—Gen. 1:12, 21, 25.

“Go to the ant, you lazy one; . . . it has gathered its food supplies even in the harvest.” (Prov. 6:6-8) Critics scoffed that no ants did this, but in 1871 a British naturalist discovered ants that maintained granaries. They are called harvester ants. The Bible knew about them hundreds of years before Christ.

The genetic blueprint in the fertilized human egg cell contains programs for all the bodily parts, before any hint of their presence. Compare Psalm 139:16: “Your eyes [Jehovah’s] saw even the embryo of me, and in your book all its parts were down in writing, as regards the days when they were formed and there was not yet one among them.”