Newton read God in the Bible
If England remained Catholic, Issac Newton might not have emerged as one of the greatest scientists in the world.
But, Newton does not seem to have been a faithful follower of the Church of England.
His mother’s brother, a clergyman who had been an undergraduate at Cambridge, persuaded his mother that it would be better for Isaac to go to university, so in 1661 he went up to Trinity College, Cambridge. Isaac paid his way through college for the first three years by waiting tables and cleaning rooms for the fellows (faculty) and the wealthier students. In 1664, he was elected a scholar, guaranteeing four years of financial support. Unfortunately, at that time the plague was spreading across Europe, and reached Cambridge in the summer of 1665. The university closed, and Newton returned home, where he spent two years concentrating on problems in mathematics and physics. He wrote later that during this time he first understood the theory of gravitation, which we shall discuss below, and the theory of optics (he was the first to realize that white light is made up of the colors of the rainbow), and much mathematics, both integral and differential calculus and infinite series. However, he was always reluctant to publish anything, at least until it appeared someone else might get credit for what he had found earlier.
On returning to Cambridge in 1667, he began to work on alchemy, but then in 1668 Nicolas Mercator published a book containing some methods for dealing with infinite series. Newton immediately wrote a treatise, De Analysi, expounding his own wider ranging results. His friend and mentor Isaac Barrow communicated these discoveries to a London mathematician, but only after some weeks would Newton allow his name to be given. This brought his work to the attention of the mathematics community for the first time. Shortly afterwards, Barrow resigned his Lucasian Professorship (which had been established only in 1663, with Barrow the first incumbent) at Cambridge so that Newton could have the Chair.
Newton's first major public scientific achievement was the invention, design and construction of a reflecting telescope. He ground the mirror, built the tube, and even made his own tools for the job. This was a real advance in telescope technology, and ensured his election to membership in the Royal Society. The mirror gave a sharper image than was possible with a large lens because a lens focusses different colors at slightly different distances, an effect called chromatic aberration. This problem is minimized nowadays by using compound lenses, two lenses of different kinds of glass stuck together, that err in opposite directions, and thus tend to cancel each other’s shortcomings, but mirrors are still used in large telescopes.
Later in the 1670's, Newton became very interested in theology. He studied Hebrew scholarship and ancient and modern theologians at great length, and became convinced that Christianity had departed from the original teachings of Christ. He felt unable to accept the current beliefs of the Church of England, which was unfortunate because he was required as a Fellow of Trinity College to take holy orders. Happily, the Church of England was more flexible than Galileo had found the Catholic Church in these matters, and King Charles II issued a royal decree excusing Newton from the necessity of taking holy orders! Actually, to prevent this being a wide precedent, the decree specified that, in perpetuity, the Lucasian professor need not take holy orders. (The current Lucasian professor is Stephen Hawking.)
http://galileoandeinstein.physics.virginia.edu/lectures/newton.html
So, his talent and great achievements allowed him to be free from social sanctions concerning religion. Hence, Newton expressed his idea on God in his works sometimes.
Isaac Newton On God
NOVEMBER 30, 2010 / PRAYSON DANIEL
Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), founder of Classical Physics and Infinitesimal Calculus
1. At the end of his Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (London, 1687) Newton wrote:
“This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of His dominion He is wont to be called Lord God.” (Newton 1687, Principia).
2. “From His true dominion it follows that the true God is a living, intelligent and powerful Being; and from His other perfections, that He is supreme, or most perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, His duration reaches from eternity to eternity; His presence from infinity to infinity; He governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done.” (Newton 1687, Principia; see also Caputo 2000, 88).
3. “God made and governs the world invisibly, and has commanded us to love and worship him, and no other God; to honor our parents and masters, and love our neighbours as ourselves; and to be temperate, just, and peaceable, and to be merciful even to brute beasts. And by the same power by which he gave life at first to every species of animals, he is able to revive the dead, and has revived Jesus Christ our Redeemer, who has gone into the heavens to receive a kingdom, and prepare a place for us, and is next in dignity to God, and may be worshipped as the Lamb of God, and has sent the Holy Ghost to comfort us in his absence, and will at length return and reign over us.” (Newton, as cited in Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton by Sir David Brewster, Edinburgh, Thomas Constable and Co., 1855, Vol. II, 354).
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6. “The supreme God exists necessarily, and by the same necessity He exists always and everywhere.” (Newton 1687, Principia; see also Caputo 2000, 88).Probably genius Newton could read something ordinary readers could not sense in the Bible. The nature was a source of inexhaustible scientific mysteries, but the Bible seems to have been also a source of inexhaustible spiritual mysteries.
7. “Atheism is so senseless. When I look at the solar system, I see the earth at the right distance from the sun to receive the proper amounts of heat and light. This did not happen by chance.” (Newton, as cited in Tiner 1975).
8. “I have a fundamental belief in the Bible as the Word of God, written by men who were inspired. I study the Bible daily.” (Newton, as cited in Tiner 1975).
9. “I find more sure marks of authenticity in the Bible than in any profane history whatsoever.” (Newton, as cited in Morris 1982, 26).
Indeed, for example, physical constants do not have to be inherently constant always across the great universe with full of stars and through all ages and time. If the gravitational constant was not constant and stable, apples must have fallen on the ground in every different manner. Even the earth should not be able to maintain a fixed orbit around the sun. In such a case, no human species emerged on the earth.
In other words, Issac Newton must have come to be convinced that this whole universe and the nature were created by God for human beings. Compared with modern scientists of today, scientific knowledge of Newton was so limited, but he could see the essence and the core of the physical world that surrounds us more accurately and innately than modern scientists.
We are still on the shore of a great ocean God created.
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Joh 9:4 I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.
Joh 9:5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
Joh 9:6 When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay,
Joh 9:7 And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing.
