Q & A with Professor Walter J. Veith | Scientist and a Christian

Can a scientist use strictly science to believe the Bible?

Science by itself will never convince anyone to believe the Bible, because in the scientific world, most people are pre-programmed. It is ingrained that there is this evolutionary paradigm, so people will not change. They are taught that the Bible account is a myth, an allegory. It cannot be a scientific fact. The Flood story in the Bible is related to the Babylonian flood models, the Aztec flood models, or any other flood model. Somewhere there’s a basis but that’s all myth.

But once you start reading the evidence literally, the scientists say you have a screw loose somewhere. When you test the creation theory, you actually find that the evidence shows that the creation account could be true, but it takes another jump—a mega leap, and to get that mega leap you have to first discover that God is, and that He is personally involved in your life. It’s when I discovered prophecy, particularly Daniel 7, and that history is written in advance, that I was cornered. It just blew me away. Here was such a magnificent description of history in advance and there was no way around it. It stuns me that there are people in churches today who don’t see the significance and relevance of prophecy. The whole of the Reformation saw it. They hewed it in stone. Yet today people are so blasé. They don’t care anymore.

The way you characterize the scientific community is in complete contradiction to the conventional wisdom of what scientists are. They’re supposed to be learned, informed, objective, and accomplished at eliminating personal bias, such that they do objective work. You’re saying something completely different.

Take a look at the greatest proponent of the evolutionary paradigm living today—Richard Dawkins. He wrote some magnificent books on evolution. If you read his books, you will see how he vehemently attacks anything that is remotely connected to God. He calls the Creator a “tinkerer.” He is derogatory to the nth degree when it comes to anything religious. There’s an emotion involved there. This is not just a scientific basis. I can understand it, because I had the same emotion, but he cannot make the paradigm shift. Of course what he writes is, pardon my language, total garbage, but he doesn’t know it, because to him it’s perfectly logical.

Do you think Richard Dawkins doesn’t know that there’s holes in his theory, or he does know it and has some doubts but isn’t strong or courageous enough to accept that line of inquiry?

I believe he won’t entertain the doubt. It’s so interesting that in his latest book he writes, “God almost certainly does not exist,” which is a misnomer in itself. You can’t “almost certainly” not exist. God is either there or He isn’t.

How do you reconcile being both a Christian and being a scientist? Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?

In actual fact, once you understand what the Bible is all about, then science becomes real for the first time because you are investigating from a position of strength when you believe the Bible. The collaboration is so overwhelming, and in the end, it’s hard to understand why the others don’t see it that way, because it is a paradigm shift of 180 degrees. It’s the same evidence but from a different perspective. So I have no problem with science and religion being reconciled because the Author of science and the Author of the universe are one and the same.

We’re taught that science is objective with no preconceived notions or irrational beliefs and that things should be investigated with pure objectivity and pure reason. So, if you’re a Christian first, isn’t that a bias and does it not therefore compromise the claim to be a scientist?

It could be perceived as such, but if the evidence fits, then why not accept it? Why must we exclude the evidence purely on the basis of there being also an aspect of it in the Bible? If you exclude truth because it correlates with something in the Bible, then what you have is error. If you’re going to say, “I cannot accept a Biblical flood because it comes from the Bible,” and yet all the evidence points to a Biblical flood, then you are excluding truth for the sake of error.

You were working in an environment where I presume the vast majority of the people you were with day to day were non-believers or secular?

Strangely enough some of them were actually believers, but they didn’t believe the Biblical paradigm. The geologists wouldn’t believe the universal Flood—it didn’t fit into their science perspective. But a look at the fossils points to the evidence of a flood. The vast majority of all fossils are buried in mud deposits, water deposits. But there can’t have been a flood in their paradigm, so they always have to rationalize.

They say the fossils were buried in flood plains. But do flood plains stretch over entire continents? These would have had to be mega flood plains! You can’t get the kind of effects seen in the geological column unless you have a Biblical universal flood. But the flood doesn’t fit their paradigm. Another example is the universal chalk layer, which means that there was a universal coverage of water. That doesn’t fit their paradigm either, so they have to exclude that fact for the sake of their science.

How do you sustain your faith in the face of all that disagreement or rejection of your fundamental point of view?

At the beginning it was quite tough. You feel like you don’t want to even bring the subject of your faith up. You want to just keep it to yourself, to keep quiet, but eventually you get to where you realize this battle is not about you. This is a bigger battle. This battle is about truth. It’s about Christ.

Then I started to understand what the world is doing to Jesus Christ, how at every turn it is HE that is downplayed, never someone else, always HIM. You never hear anything negative about any of the other religions. You hear, “Oh, you’re a Buddhist, oh that’s great! Meditation and all that…wonderful!” “Oh, you’re this or that, how nice…” Islam is taking a bit of flack at the moment but even there, the excuse is given “Oh, that’s just radical Islam.” But when it comes to Jesus, it’s unbelievable what they do to Him.

Whether you listen to the media, or the scientific world, or elsewhere, He’s always put down. The amazing thing is that nobody argues with Islam when it propagates creation. The argument is always with the Christian scientist. He’s irrational. Islam? No, that’s part of the package. He can be a creationist, that’s to be understood, but not a Christian. To the Christian, they say, “You can’t be a believer and a scientist at the same time.” It is obvious that the war is not about me or you. The war is about truth.

God seems to have led you to Him through the power of your mind and your reason rather than some cathartic emotional conversion. Some Christians would argue that unless you have that emotional conversion, you’re not really moved by the Holy Spirit and your conversion isn’t real. How would you respond to that based on your experience?

It is true that I had a purely logical academic conversion—based on historic fact as depicted in the prophecies, and based on the disparities I saw in the scientific world and the evidence in the natural world. I had a totally intellectual conversion. I knew nothing about Jesus Christ at first. I had no personal relationship with Him, no walk with Him. Purely on that rational basis I decided—the evidence is there, then HE must be there.

If you don’t have an emotional experience in the beginning, then the only thing you have is faith. With an emotional experience, you don’t need that much faith. Faith is the evidence of things not seen. Without faith it is impossible to please God, so faith in my opinion is more Biblical than an emotional experience. I had nothing but faith. I didn’t know God. I, by faith, accepted that He is. I said to Him, “Since the evidence points to Your existence, I want to meet You,” and we started our life together. His involvement is not one of euphoria, but one of relationship. By faith I accept that He is there and involved in my life.