Reviewed by Thomas P. Sheahen

In his latest book, The Hidden Face of God [1], Gerald Schroeder offers an exceptional level of scientific explanation to support the view that religion and science are compatible, not opposed. Indeed, the book's subtitle, Science reveals the Ultimate Truth, tells us that the author finds in science a pathway toward God.

Born in America and educated at MIT, Schroeder emigrated to Israel some years ago, where he studied the Torah with great care, including especially the interpretation given to it by the Kabalistic school of thought. An earlier book by Schroeder, The Science of God, combined the thinking of the 13th-century Kabalist scholar Nachmonodies with modern cosmology and general relativity, and thereby found a way out of a dilemma (a seeming conflict) between modern physics and an Orthodox reading of Scripture. In The Hidden Face of God, Schroeder leaves physics and instead goes into molecular biology.

He also shows that the proponents of scientific materialism are missing a lot of the essential science when they glibly say that evolution and natural selection are driven only by random fluctuations. They revert to cognitive dissonance in order to cling to materialism in the face of overwhelming evidence for a metaphysical cause. Schroeder says he used to believe that line, until he took the trouble to study molecular biology.

Schroeder's key theme is wisdom. His version of the first line of Genesis 1 is "With wisdom God created the heavens and the earth." -- this differs from the customary translation "in the beginning," but comes from the Kabalistic tradition. Throughout the book, Schroeder frequently shows how a feature along the road to humanity is not just a "surprising coincidence" but is evidence that wisdom was built into the system from the outset. In several instances, after presenting scientific facts, he identifies a place in Scripture and shows how it says the same thing, and points out the link to the wisdom hidden beneath it all. Schroeder goes on to assert that wisdom is the basis of information, and "...our universe may be the manifestation of information."

Rooted in Orthodox Jewish tradition, Schroeder is unquestionably among those who accept that the universe is intelligently designed, but adds a scientific aspect. He carefully describes the way the human eye works, and points out the apparent "design error" of having the photoreceptors behind the retina, such that the pathway for signals produced there leads back through to the front of the retina, where ganglions are bundled into the optic nerve, which then goes back through the retina once again enroute to the brain. "In essence, the human retina is designed inside-out." (This has been a favorite argument of neo-Darwinists against intelligent design.) Schroeder cites Biblical examples to conclude that "...intelligent design, even at the level of the Divine, is not necessarily perfect design." He warns "If your image of God is based on a simplistic model of the Divine, don't expect that image to rest easily with the Bible's concept of God or with the real world." Schroeder is entirely comfortable in both his science and his religion, and thus provides a good example to many others striving to reconcile the two. In Schroeder's presentation, the science comes first, and Scripture confirms it.

In a series of chapters that describe the nervous system, the brain, and the distinction between the brain and the mind, Schroeder conveys a high level of scientific information while maintaining a high level of clarity and readability. The brain is surely the platform for the mind, but the mind is a new, emergent property that cannot be squeezed into the limits of scientific materialism. He cites the example of a chess-playing computer to illustrate the difference.

Regarding consciousness, there is a remarkable similarity in Schroeder's thoughts to the ideas of Teilhard de Chardin [2] a half century ago: Schreoder writes: "A grain of sand contains the slightest hint of the skyscraper of which it is to become a part. Do the very elements of the brain, the carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, have within them the barest trace of consciousness, which will combine and emerge as the complexity of a fully functioning brain?" This is all quite similar to Teilhard's notion of the within of everything, in which there is an element of consciousness associated with every atom, remaining nascent through the emergence of successive layers of complexity, until consciousness emerges at last. It might be enormously fruitful to combine the future-oriented Christianity of Teilhard with the Talmudic scholarship of Schroeder - who knows where it might lead?

The book contains three helpful appendices that explain DNA, proteins, cells and muscular action to the unfamiliar reader.

Incidentally, Schroeder's chapter 5, "Meiosis and the Making of a Human", is the classiest description of human reproduction I have ever seen. Parents can read it along with their pre-teen child with complete confidence in both the scientific accuracy and the respect for human dignity contained in Schroeder's words.

This book contributes to advancing the mind/brain discussion, by emphasizing the distinction between them, and explaining the linkages with care. His biology is rock-solid, accurate and quite readable. By insisting upon close attention to detail, Schroeder gives the reader a vision of God's hand at work in the creation of human beings (including the brain and mind).

This is the first book I know of that makes accessible to the lay reader a clear understanding of microbiology and brain function. Rather than dumbing-down for the non-biologist, Schroeder motivates the reader to step up to learn more. Book-reading clubs can read and discuss one chapter per week.

Thanks to a high level of lifetime scholarship spanning physics, microbiology and Orthodox Jewish tradition, Gerald Schroeder writes from a position of strength, unswayed by popular fashion among pretenders to scientific expertise. The religiously oriented reader will be reassured to find so many ways in which modern science is confirmed by Scripture. The reader antagonistic to religion will be challenged to reconsider materialistic beliefs that may have been formed hastily, without adequate attention to the scientific evidence.

The Hidden Face of God is an excellent book. I recommend it highly.

[1] Touchstone Books, Simon & Schuster: 2001. Paperback, ISBN 0-7432-0325-9 ($ 13 retail); 187 pages + appendices + index

[2] P. Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man , (in French, 1955; English transl by B. Wall, Harper Torchbooks: 1961)

Published   2003.06.18