Twenty great scientists who were theists

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The idea that science and belief in God have always been enemies is difficult to reconcile with history. Many of the people who transformed our understanding of nature were theists, believing that the universe was created or governed by a divine intelligence.

Their beliefs were not identical. They included Christians of several denominations, Muslims and Jews, while some held views that departed from religious orthodoxy. What they shared was the conviction that studying nature was compatible with belief in a creator.

1. Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton developed the laws of motion and universal gravitation, made fundamental discoveries in optics and helped establish calculus. He wrote extensively about God and biblical history, although some of his private theological beliefs differed considerably from orthodox Christianity.

2. Galileo Galilei
Galileo transformed astronomy through his telescopic observations, including the discovery of Jupiter’s largest moons and the phases of Venus. Although his support for the Sun-centred model brought him into conflict with Church authorities, he remained a believing Catholic and did not consider science inherently opposed to Scripture.

3. Nicolaus Copernicus
Copernicus developed the heliocentric model in which Earth and the other planets orbit the Sun. He served as a Catholic canon and regarded the mathematical order of the heavens as reflecting the work of God.

4. Johannes Kepler
Kepler discovered the three laws describing planetary motion and helped establish modern astronomy. A committed Lutheran, he viewed his scientific work as an attempt to understand the mathematical order God had placed within creation.

5. Francis Bacon
Bacon was an influential advocate of observation and experimentation as the foundations of scientific enquiry. He believed that the study of Scripture and the study of nature were two different ways of learning about God’s works.

6. Blaise Pascal
Pascal made important contributions to mathematics, probability, fluid mechanics and the development of mechanical calculators. He was also a deeply religious Christian whose writings on faith, reason and human nature were published after his death as the Pensées.

7. Robert Boyle
Often called one of the founders of modern chemistry, Boyle is best known for Boyle’s law, describing the relationship between the pressure and volume of a gas. He was a devout Anglican who funded Bible translations and wrote extensively in defence of Christianity.

8. Robert Hooke
Hooke made major contributions to physics, astronomy, engineering and microscopy. His book Micrographia revealed a previously unseen microscopic world and introduced the biological term “cell”. His writings indicate belief in a divine creator whose workmanship could be examined through nature.

9. Nicolaus Steno
Steno made foundational contributions to anatomy, geology and palaeontology. His principles concerning rock layers helped establish the science of stratigraphy. Originally a Lutheran, he converted to Catholicism and later became a bishop.

10. Carl Linnaeus
Linnaeus established the system of binomial nomenclature still used to give organisms their scientific names. Raised in a Lutheran family, he regarded the classification of plants and animals as a way of revealing the order within God’s creation.

11. Leonhard Euler
Euler was one of history’s most productive mathematicians, making lasting contributions to calculus, number theory, mechanics and mathematical notation. He was also a committed Christian in the Reformed tradition who wrote in defence of his religious beliefs.

12. Michael Faraday
Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction and established principles that made electric motors, transformers and generators possible. He belonged to the Sandemanian Church and was known for the seriousness with which he practised his Christian faith.

13. James Prescott Joule
Joule demonstrated the relationship between mechanical work and heat, helping establish the principle of conservation of energy. The unit of energy known as the joule was named after him. He was a Christian who believed that studying natural laws revealed the order created by God.

14. James Clerk Maxwell
Maxwell formulated the equations that unified electricity, magnetism and light, laying important foundations for modern physics. He was a committed Presbyterian whose scientific work existed alongside a thoughtful and enduring Christian faith.

15. Gregor Mendel
Mendel discovered the fundamental laws of heredity through his experiments with pea plants, earning recognition as the founder of genetics. He was an Augustinian friar and later became abbot of his monastery in what is now the Czech Republic.

16. Louis Pasteur
Pasteur transformed chemistry and medicine through his work on microorganisms, vaccination and pasteurisation. He was raised as a Catholic and continued to identify with belief in God, although historians differ over the exact nature and intensity of his religious practice at different stages of his life.

17. George Washington Carver
Carver was an agricultural scientist whose research helped farmers improve depleted soils through crop rotation and alternative crops. A deeply committed Christian, he frequently described scientific discovery as a means of understanding the possibilities God had placed within nature.

18. Georges Lemaître
Lemaître was a Belgian physicist and Catholic priest who proposed that the universe had expanded from an initial state, an idea that became central to the Big Bang theory. He carefully distinguished science from theology and resisted attempts to use his cosmological theory as a simple proof of creation.

19. Arthur Compton
Arthur Compton was an American physicist who received the 1927 Nobel Prize in Physics for discovering the Compton effect, which demonstrated the particle-like behaviour of electromagnetic radiation. He was a committed Presbyterian who believed that scientific investigation and faith in God were compatible.

20. John Polkinghorne
Polkinghorne made significant contributions to theoretical particle physics before leaving academic science to become an Anglican priest. He later became one of the leading modern writers on the relationship between science and Christian belief.

Science and belief

These scientists did not all interpret God, Scripture or religious tradition in the same way. Nor does their faith demonstrate that any particular religious claim is scientifically true. It does, however, show that scientific achievement and theism have frequently coexisted.

For many of these figures, belief in an ordered creation encouraged scientific investigation. They expected nature to be understandable and believed that discovering its laws was a worthwhile way of exploring reality. Their lives demonstrate that the historical relationship between science and faith is far richer and more complex than a simple conflict between the two.

Twenty great scientists who were theists

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