A Theology of Everything

Abstract

The rise of natural theology in the seventeenth century did not originate in theology, but in science. It was not started by theologians trying from above to impress a religious perspective on science. On the contrary, the natural theology of the century of the Enlightenment began as a grass-roots movement among believing scientists who were convinced both that God's existence could be proved and some of His attributes described from below, that is, on the basis of the expanding world of scientific knowledge. Essentially they were arguing for the existence of a Deity whose direct intervention would explain the gaps in the scientific discourse. But this manner of reasoning made natural theology extremely vulnerable. It would clearly lose its power at the moment when the scientific discourse itself became sufficiently advanced to close the gaps by its own force.