An interesting little discussion on the intersection of science and religion has unfolded in Special relativity and the Bahá�í Faith. In references in Some Answered Questions and elsewhere, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá speaks of “ether,” a con…

“Reflect that light is the expression of the vibrations of the etheric matter: the nerves of the eye are affected by these vibrations, and sight is produced. The light of the lamp exists through the vibration of the etheric matter; so also does that of the sun, but what a difference between the light of the sun and that of the stars or the lamp!”

But reference to “ether” is not made here from the standpoint of a holy man proclaiming the truth of a scientific concept. Rather, He explains the state of science (rather well, I might add), and goes on to use the relative intensity and energy of sun light compared to lamp light — both of which interact with animal eyes in the same fashion — as an analogy for a spiritual concept. Understanding the spiritual concept is what matters here, not the state of science 100 years after the above was uttered.

Though this is admittedly but one sample from the many science-referencing quotations from the Central Figures, it seems to me that the majority of such statements are intended to construct a semblance of a picture of spiritual reality — that is, they are not intended to absolutely accurately describe physical reality.

“…Although a brief example hath been given concerning the beginning and ending of the relative world, the world of attributes, yet a second illustration is now added, that the full meaning may be manifest. For instance, let thine Eminence consider his own self; thou art first in relation to thy son, last in relation to thy father. In thine outward appearance, thou tellest of the appearance of power in the realms of divine creation; in thine inward being thou revealest the hidden mysteries which are the divine trust deposited within thee. And thus firstness and lastness, outwardness and inwardness are, in the sense referred to, true of thyself, that in these four states conferred upon thee thou shouldst comprehend the four divine states, and that the nightingale of thine heart on all the branches of the rosetree of existence, whether visible or concealed, should cry out: “He is the first and the last, the Seen and the Hidden….”

These statements are made in the sphere of that which is relative, because of the limitations of men. Otherwise, those personages who in a single step have passed over the world of the relative and the limited, and dwelt on the fair plane of the Absolute, and pitched their tent in the worlds of authority and command—have burned away these relativities with a single spark, and blotted out these words with a drop 28 of dew. And they swim in the sea of the spirit, and soar in the holy air of light. Then what life have words, on such a plane, that “first” and “last” or other than these be seen or mentioned! In this realm, the first is the last itself, and the last is but the first. …”

page 17 The Seven Valleys and the Four Valleys, Bahá’u’lláh

My daughter is doing a PhD in astrophysics - her topic is an aspect of star formation. There are new discoveries almost every day in astrophysics, most of which show that the universe is a lot stranger than we had imagined. And even objects that wel all “know” to exist - such a black holes - may not, in fact, exist at all. There is certainly at least one research group that is working on an alternative model in which what we think of as black holes are “dark energy” stars and this new model (which has not yet been widely accepted) could account for the missing matter in the universe.

Anyway, the point is that science is not a set of fixed or absolute “truths”, but an approach to developing knowledge that inevitably involves challenging established theories and models. It’s a shifting field. Before Einstein published his theories of relativity, there were physicists at the end of the 19th century who thought they’d discovered everything that could be known! I’ve even read that Stephen Hawking thought that we were coming to the end of physics. I don’t see how we can ever come to the end of physics or of any other fundamental field of science.

So it is highly risky, philosophically speaking, to tie one’s faith to any one scientific theory.