I’ve been doing a lot of research into Judaism. They seem to encourage asking tough questions and taking the answers seriously, which is good.
After reading a bit of the Torah, it got me thinking, why aren’t there any references to people who could not have been known to its followers at the time? No mention of East Asians or Native Americans. Did God just forget about them when he talked through Moses? Or he thought they weren’t important enough to mention?
Then it got me thinking some more. What about science? Wouldn’t it be effective to convince followers of legitimacy if a religion could accurately predict a scientific phenomenon before its followers have the means of discovering it? Say, “And God said, let there be bacteria! And then there was bacteria.” But there is nothing like that. Anywhere, as far as I can tell. Among any religion.
I’m not a theologian and I’m always interested in learning more, so any insights would be helpful.
Edit: A lot of responses seem to be saying “people wouldn’t have had a use for that knowledge at the time” seem to be parroting religious talking points without fully understanding their implications. Why would God only tell people what they would have a use for at the time? Why wouldn’t he give them information that could expand the possibilities of what they were capable of? Why does it matter if people had a word for something at the time? Couldn’t God just tell them new words for new things? If God was only telling them things that were relevant to them at the time, why didn’t He say so? Also, how come he doesn’t come back and tell us things that are relevant now, or at least mention that he isn’t coming back?
I am a Christian.
First and foremost, the Bible isn’t a science textbook. The main focus of the Bible is essentially how we need a saviour and that the saviour is coming (the old testament). And then the Gospels of the New Testament is when the saviour comes, and the Epistles are how we should respond.
The Old Testament contains the prophecy of Isaiah, which states that a saviour will come:
Isaiah 9:6-7
Isaiah 53:3-12 KJV
Generally, the viewpoint I will give is that this prophecy was definitely written before Jesus came (we even have a physical copy of it that predates Christ’s birth) and that it prophesied Jesus perfectly. I’d point to the New Testament and how the eyewitness accounts are written as eyewitness accounts, and those eyewitnesses are reliable and even died for what they saw. Essentially, Christianity hinges on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, NOT scientific claims which are irrelevant.
however
For a period in history, scientists believed the universe had eternally existed. The idea of a “beginning” was seen as religious dogma and hubris. Until the big bang was discovered. Now it’s normal that people believe there was a beginning. Some would point out that the patterns in the genesis creation narrative do add up, albeit not literal 24 hour days (such as light coming first, dry land, plants, animals, then humans. I even heard a theory that the plants could have cleared a mist causing the cosmos to become visible. But there is a symmetrical pattern there.) although I believe that the whole point of that is just “God is the creator. And He saw it was good.” It would be very off if it started going into molecular biology or atomic physics. Especially since this narrative was likely captured via oral tradition.
Some would claim that Job describes a water cycle and other observations before it would have been known about. Although I wouldn’t hinge my faith on this as people back then may have been more observant than we give them credit for.
Job 36:26-28
Earth being suspended in space:
Job 26:7
Also a creature is mentioned, some may say it was a dinosaur being described.
Job 40:15-20
However, again, I think people trying to view religious texts as a scientific textbook are looking at it wrong. We don’t need God to explain the natural world to us. We can observe it for ourselves. What we cannot observe are things like what happens after death, right and wrong, etc. The idea that, at least from a Christian perspective, that Christianity and natural science are two completely different things is wrong. Christianity isn’t about science. It’s about Christ and His salvation plan for us. It would be really out of place for the Bible to just become a scientific textbook. God is concerned with greater things- notably, how to save our soul.
Lastly, it is worth mentioning: early scientists were motivated to study science as they believed it was God’s creation and they wanted to understand it. If there was a lawgiver, then there must be laws (of science), they thought.
This was a lot of words just to say “no”.
The Big Bang isn’t necessarily seen as the “beginning” of the universe, it’s really just the idea that if we rewind time, all the galaxies that we see currently see moving away from each other would be in the same location. The universe could be eternal and cyclical; the big bang could just be the beginning of the last cycle.
OP’s question is something I’ve though about myself. It would be so easy for a God talking to a person to just drop one tiny factoid to be verified later. You could say germs exist, you could say the planets orbit the sun, you could mention atoms, disease, almost anything. Instead God told a man to murder his own son to win a bet over nothing with someone he doesn’t even like because “trust me bro”. Jews and Muslims still won’t eat pork because they couldn’t figure out how to safely cook it 2000 years ago.
There is one honorable mention: Hinduism states that the age of the universe is about 4.32 billion years. Today scientists believe that the universe is about 13.79 billion years old.