The Bible and the Victorians

Natural Theology

Science vs. Religion?

Charles Darwin 1809-1882

• On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life 1859
  • Scientific Racism

• The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex 1871
  • Scientific Patriarchalism
  • Social Darwinism (social sciences)

   

• Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms 1881

• Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, including an autobiographical chapter (ed. Francis Darwin), 1887
  • Loss of Faith
  • Agnosticism

Issues at stake:

• Secular reasoning
• Authority of scientists
• Authority of Bible
• God and human suffering

T. H. Huxley

• Agnosticism (cf. Atheism)
• Ethics and Evolution 1893
• The "ought" from the "is".
• Naturalistic Ethics
• 1870 Education Act
• The Bible and the London School Board

Positivism

• August Comte
• "altruism" (vs. "egoism")
• John Stuart Mill

What is religion?

• A Plot?
• A Mistake?
• Ludwig Feuerbach
• The Essence of Christianity 1841
  • Psychological projection
• Karl Marx
  • Social Fantasy

   

Biblical Criticism

• Higher Criticism
• German Universities
• David Friedrich Strauss
• Life of Jesus 1835
• trans. George Eliot, 1846

Church of England

• Essays and Reviews, 1860
  • "Interpret the scripture like any other book."
• Bishop J. W. Colenso
• The Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua Critically Examined (people's edition, 1865)