Geocentric creationism

The geocentric view of cosmology—especially the Ptolemaic model influenced by Greek thought—remained the dominant framework until the Copernican Revolution of the 16th century.{{Cite book |last1=Plantinga |first1=Richard J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y6KIEAAAQBAJ&dq=early+church+geocentrism&pg=PA640 |title=An Introduction to Christian Theology |last2=Thompson |first2=Thomas R. |last3=Lundberg |first3=Matthew D. |date=2022-11-03 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-108-48004-8 |language=en}} During which multiple Christian theologians such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, Philip Melancthon and the Catholic Robert Bellarmine rejected the implications of heliocentrism due to their understanding of the Bible.{{Cite book |last=Schneider |first=Gary W. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3-4lEAAAQBAJ&dq=John+Calvin+Geocentrism&pg=PA1024 |title=A Fresh Look at Genesis 1-2: How God's Book of Nature is Concordant with His Book of Scripture |date=2021-03-15 |publisher=Rio Pindo Publishing, LLC |language=en}}

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Such individuals like Luther often were strong in their critiques of the Heliocentric model, and Luther is famously recorded as saying that Copernicus was a "fool who turned the whole science of astronomy upside down," reflecting his view that the new model contradicted Scripture and centuries of accepted truth.{{Cite book |last=Lamoureux |first=Denis O. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wvXkDwAAQBAJ&dq=geocentrism+Luther&pg=PA121 |title=Evolutionary Creation: A Christian Approach to Evolution |date=2009-02-26 |publisher=Lutterworth Press |isbn=978-0-7188-4284-0 |language=en}}

Resistance to heliocentrism continued beyond theological objections. The Protestant Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, also rejected the Copernican system. However, Brahe attempted to find scientific explanations for Geocentrism. Aware of the observational advantages of Copernicus's model of the Universe, particularly in explaining planetary motion—Brahe developed a compromised system that attempted to preserve the Geocentric model while attempting to explain the observations of planetary movement. In his model, the Sun and Moon revolved around the Earth, which remained stationary at the center of the universe, while the other planets orbited the Sun. This system was also adopted by many Jesuit astronomers of the 16th and 17th centuries. However, Tycho's successor and a fellow Protestant Johannes Kepler (1571 – 1630) did not follow Tycho's compromised theory, but instead defended the heliocentric view that all the planets orbit the Sun.{{Cite book |last=Mendillo |first=Michael |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cxFoEAAAQBAJ&dq=Brahe+Tycho+geocentrism+Protestant&pg=PA113 |title=Saints and Sinners in the Sky: Astronomy, Religion and Art in Western Culture |date=2022-04-04 |publisher=Springer Nature |isbn=978-3-030-84270-3 |page=113-116 |language=en}} Nevertheless, according to the Reformed professor R. Scott Clark, some Reformed theologians such as Wilhelmius A Brakel resisted heliocentrism even until the 18th century.{{Cite web |title=Geocentrism Anyone? - The Heidelblog |url=https://heidelblog.net/2025/02/geocentrism-anyone/ |access-date=2025-05-04 |website=heidelblog.net/ |language=en-US}}File:TychoBraheNewWorldSystemHypothesis1588.jpg

The "Galileo affair" happened in Western Christianity, for which Pope John Paul II later issued a verdict that admitted the condemnation of Galileo to have been an error. However, some Eastern Orthodox writers were also affected. Like in the West, many Eastern Christians had taught geocentrism, although they did not accept the Ptolemaic model of Geocentrism, but rather the system of Cosmas Indicopleustes. The first contacts with Russian Orthodoxy to Copernicus' heliocentrism came around the 17th century through a cosmological book which noted both models of Cosmology. For some time the hybrid model of Tycho Brahe was propagated as a better solution to the debates surrounding Geocentrism, although neither the Russian and Greek Orthodox ever condemned the Heliocentric, as they did not believe different cosmological theories to be dangerous.{{Cite journal |last=Obolevitch |first=Teresa |date=2015 |title=Galileo in the Russian Orthodox Context: History, Philosophy, Theology, and Science |url=https://philpapers.org/rec/OBOGIT |journal=Zygon |volume=50 |issue=4 |pages=788–808 |doi=10.1111/zygo.12219|doi-access=free }}

Modern Christians generally reject the geocentric model, and the strict understanding of the verses used to defend it in the medieval age. However, despite scientific advances, even today a few still try to cling unto the Geocentric model of the past. This has been influenced by the Dutch-Canadian named Walter Van der Kamp founded the Tychonic Society around the 1970s, which promoted the geocentric view that Copernicus was mistaken and that the Earth remains stationary at the center of the universe.{{Cite book |last=Miller |first=Ron |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TO6XAgAAQBAJ&dq=Walter+van+der+Kamp+geocentrism&pg=PA71 |title=Recentering the Universe: The Radical Theories of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Newton |date=2013-08-01 |publisher=Twenty-First Century Books |isbn=978-1-4677-1662-8 |page=71 |language=en}} One of the most prominent geocentric creationists of the 20th century is the Protestant Gerardus Bouw, director of the Association for Biblical Astronomy and author of several books defending geocentrism. {{Cite book |last=Gutjahr |first=Paul |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=R3s7DwAAQBAJ&dq=The+Oxford+Handbook+of+the+Bible+in+America&pg=PR35 |title=The Oxford Handbook of the Bible in America |date=2017-11-01 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-068483-9 |page=225 |language=en}}{{Cite book |last=Ross |first=Hugh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UJRbBcF6YsMC&dq=geocentrism+Gerardus+Bouw&pg=PA290 |title=More Than a Theory (Reasons to Believe): Revealing a Testable Model for Creation |date=2009-03-01 |publisher=Baker Books |isbn=978-1-4412-0399-1 |language=en}} And although unlike other Geocentrist advocates, Bouw had a PhD in astronomy, his views are not taken seriously by the scientific community.

Articles arguing that geocentrism was the biblical perspective appeared in some early creation science newsletters associated with the Creation Research Society pointing to some passages in the Bible which they interpreted as indicating a stationary earth,{{cite book |last=Numbers |first=Ronald L. |url=https://archive.org/details/creationistsevol0000numb/page/237 |title=The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism |publisher=University of California Press |year=1993 |isbn=978-0-5200-8393-6 |location=Berkeley, CA |page=[https://archive.org/details/creationistsevol0000numb/page/237 237] |lccn=93015804 |oclc=810488078 |orig-year=Originally published 1992; New York: Alfred A. Knopf}}{{Cite web |title=The Creation/Evolution Continuum {{!}} National Center for Science Education |url=https://ncse.ngo/creationevolution-continuum |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=ncse.ngo |language=en}} and the view was also defended in 1991 by Marshall Hall, although his book was received extremely badly by Young Earth Creationist organizations.{{Cite web |title=Geocentric gobbledegook |url=https://creation.com/geocentric-gobbledegook |access-date=2025-05-02 |website=creation.com |language=en-gb}} Such religious beliefs have also been held by the traditionalist Catholic Robert Sungenis, co-author of the self-published Galileo Was Wrong: The Church Was Right (2006).{{cite news |last=Sefton |first=Dru |date=March 30, 2006 |title=In this world view, the sun revolves around the earth |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=_1kaAAAAIBAJ&dq=robert-sungenis&pg=6714%2C4991566 |access-date=2014-03-14 |newspaper=Times-News |publisher=Hendersonville Newspaper Corporation |location=Hendersonville, NC |page=5A |agency=Religion News Service}} Robert Sungenis attributed his acceptance of the geocentric model to the influence of creationist Gerardus Bouw around 2002. His work is frequently marked by criticism of mainstream scientific theories. One of his most know projects was the 2014 film The Principle, in which he featured interviews with scientists such as Lawrence Krauss. However, these scientists later stated they were unaware that the film was intended to promote geocentrism and publicly disavowed its message.{{Cite book |last=Prothero |first=Donald R. |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv17260g0 |title=Weird Earth: Debunking Strange Ideas about Our Planet |date=2020 |publisher=Red Lightning Books |isbn=978-1-68435-061-2 |page=49-52|doi=10.2307/j.ctv17260g0 |jstor=j.ctv17260g0 }} Another known traditionalist Catholic known to have taken Geocentrist stances includes Solange Hertz.{{Cite web |last=Keating |first=Karl |title=Bad Religion, Bad Science |url=https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/bad-religion-bad-science |access-date=2025-06-05 |website=Catholic Answers}} Alongside small segments of Christian Fundamentalism, there has also been a movement towards Geocentrism within some anti-evolutionary Orthodox Jewish groups, which is often motivated by the statements of the influential Rabbi Maimonides (1138–1204), who argued that the Earth is stationary.{{Cite web |last=Skeptic |date=2011-02-04 |title=Orthodox Jews & Science: An Empirical Study of their Attitudes Toward Evolution, the Fossil Record, and Modern Geology |url=https://archive.skeptic.com/archive/reading_room/orthodox-jews-and-science/ |access-date=2025-05-04 |website=Skeptic |language=en}}

The two largest modern geocentric creationist organizations include The Biblical Astronomer and Catholic Apologetics International. And there have been some signs of growth for geocentrism within creationism.

Both mainstream creationists and geocentrists agree that while the Bible is the only completely reliable source of information about knowledge on the natural world, they strongly differ on their understanding of scripture.{{Cite book |url=https://brill.com/edcollbook/title/17821 |title=Nature and Scripture in the Abrahamic Religions: 1700-Present |date=2009-01-31 |publisher=Brill |isbn=978-90-474-2524-3 |editor-last=Mandelbrote |editor-first=Scott |page=455-456 |language=en |editor-last2=Meer |editor-first2=Jitse van der}} Although some creationists such as Kent Hovind initially had a neutral opinion of geocentrism, the majority of the creationist movement have strongly rejected geocentrism, including the major organizations such as Answers in Genesis,{{Cite web |title=The Rise of the Modern Geocentric Theory Movement |url=https://answersingenesis.org/astronomy/rise-of-modern-geocentric-theory-movement/?srsltid=AfmBOoq3aByKnSLClsxYL4RUzZWic3VSqFTb1t5djWSthdovM7PUYXPO |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=Answers in Genesis |language=en}} Institute for Creation Research{{Cite web |title=Geocentricity and Creation |url=https://www.icr.org/article/geocentricity-creation/ |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=www.icr.org |language=en}} and Creation Ministries International,{{Cite web |title=Geocentrism and Creation |url=https://creation.com/geocentrism-and-creation |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=creation.com |language=en-gb}} these organizations avoid association with Geocentric movements, as they believe these movements to be harmful to Christianity.Creation Ministries International, Maintaining Creationist Integrity, 11 October 2002

According to a report released in 2014 by the National Science Foundation, 26% of Americans surveyed believe that the Sun revolves around the Earth.{{Cite news |last=Neuman |first=Scott |date=2014-02-14 |title=1 In 4 Americans Thinks The Sun Goes Around The Earth, Survey Says |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/02/14/277058739/1-in-4-americans-think-the-sun-goes-around-the-earth-survey-says |access-date=2025-05-03 |work=NPR |language=en}} Morris Berman quotes a 2006 survey that show currently some 20% of the U.S. population believe that the Sun goes around the Earth (geocentricism) rather than the Earth goes around the Sun (heliocentricism), while a further 9% claimed not to know.{{Cite book |last=Berman |first=Morris |url=https://archive.org/details/darkagesamericaf00berm |title=Dark ages America : the final phase of empire |date=2006 |publisher=New York : W.W. Norton & Co. |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-0-393-05866-6}} According to 2011 VTSIOM poll, 32% of Russians believe that the Sun orbits the Earth.{{Cite web |title=«Солнце - спутник Земли», или рейтинг научных заблуждений россиян |url=https://wciom.ru/analytical-reviews/analiticheskii-obzor/solncze-sputnik-zemli-ili-rejting-nauchnykh-zabluzhdenij-rossiyan |access-date=2025-05-03 |website=ВЦИОМ. Новости |language=ru}} However, these numbers may be influenced by scientific ignorance.{{Cite web |title=The Sun Revolves Around You? Narcissism on a Cosmic Scale {{!}} National Center for Science Education |url=https://ncse.ngo/sun-revolves-around-you-narcissism-cosmic-scale |access-date=2025-06-05 |website=ncse.ngo |language=en}}

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The Modern Geocentrist movement form a radical movement within Creationism, arguing that their perceived "scientific assault" on the religion did not begin with Evolution, but with Heliocentrism.{{Cite web |title=Geocentrism and Creation |url=https://answersingenesis.org/creationism/arguments-to-avoid/geocentrism-and-creation/?srsltid=AfmBOoqmG8r7cpw5qTqqS3wYU1kKylny9j6iCOTKIKOgeZs0IpHH5I-t |access-date=2025-04-29 |website=Answers in Genesis |language=en}} This view was explicitly held by Gerardus Bouw, who argued that the Copernican Revolution set the stage for the development of Biblical Criticism, and attacked the doctrine of Biblical literalism. He argued that the anthropocentric view of creation logically leads to a geocentric view of the Cosmos.{{Cite book |last=Gerardus D Bouw |url=https://archive.org/details/geocentricitypri0000gera_x8n8/mode/2up |title=Geocentricity primer: Introduction to Biblical cosmology |date=1999-01-01 |publisher=The Biblical Astronomer |others=Internet Archive |page=1}}

These proponents advocate for adopting the Tychonic system, which gets its name from the 16th-century Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, which places the Earth at the center of the universe while allowing the planets to orbit the Sun. This model serves as a deliberate compromise between the strict geocentrism of the Ptolemaic system and the heliocentrism of Copernicus. At the heart of the modern Geocentric view is that the Earth and his creatures are special to God, and the status of the Earth at the center of the universe symbolizes this belief.{{Cite web |title=The Creation/Evolution Continuum {{!}} National Center for Science Education |url=https://ncse.ngo/creationevolution-continuum |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=ncse.ngo |language=en}} They also believe that passages such as Joshua 10:12-13 in which God stops the sun over the valley of Ajalon are evidences of the earth being at the center of the solar system.{{Cite book |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv7h0s6j |title=How Evolution Shapes Our Lives: Essays on Biology and Society |date=2016 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-17039-8 |page=288 |doi=10.2307/j.ctv7h0s6j |jstor=j.ctv7h0s6j |quote=Geocentrists believe that the Bible presents earth as the center of the solar system. Passages cited include Joshua 10:12–13, in which God complies with Joshua’s plea to stop the sun over the Valley of Ajalon, which requires a stationary earth.}} Geocentrism has relied upon multiple verses in the Bible which seem to talk about the Earth not being moved, such as Psalm 93:1. However, due the shift from the strict interpretation of such passages from the Middle Ages, even the majority of creationists reject the strict geocentric interpretations of such passages, and instead view them phenomelogically.{{Cite book |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv7h0s6j |title=How Evolution Shapes Our Lives: Essays on Biology and Society |date=2016 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-17039-8 |page=289|doi=10.2307/j.ctv7h0s6j |jstor=j.ctv7h0s6j }}

Geocentric creationism is based on a rejection of the mainstream scientific method in favour of supernatural explanations of the Universe, arguing that God created everything that exists within 6 days around 6000 years ago and created the Universe with the Earth at its very center.THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES OF GEOCENTRISM, by Walter van der Kamp, Bulletin of the Tychonian Society, No. 49, p. 18 People such as Gerardus Bouw have argued that observation must be interpreted in harmony with the text of scripture, which he believed to be teaching a Geocentric model and that it needs to be the starting point in scientific inquiry. However, contrary to the views of Kepler and Galileo who although being Christians, believed that the scripture never speak of the inner workings of the solar system. Bouw criticized modern Christians, including the majority of Christian Fundamentalists who agree with the claim that Bible does not speak on cosmological models. Instead, he favoured supernatural explanations of the movement of the universe and the solar system that he believed to better reflect his geocentric understanding of scripture,{{Cite book |last=Gerardus D. Bouw |first=Ph D. |url=http://archive.org/details/geocentricity-christianity-in-the-woodshed |title=GEOCENTRICITY: CHRISTIANITY IN THE WOODSHED |date=2013 |chapter=Preface}} including claims such as the existence of aether, which he identified as the "firmanent" of Genesis 1.Bouw, Gerardus D., "Massive Superstrings and the Firmament," pp. 11-20 in Sixth European Creationist Congress. Evangelical College, Amersfoort, August 16-19, 1995 Due to this, he ended up modifying the cosmology of Tycho Brahe's model further by adjusting the stars also to be centered on the Sun rather than the Earth to explain the aberration of starlight. This way, he believed that his modified geocentric model would be observationally equivalent to heliocentrism, concluding that one needed theological rather than purely scientific reasoning to establish the correct position.{{Cite book |url=https://brill.com/edcollbook/title/17821 |title=Nature and Scripture in the Abrahamic Religions: 1700-Present |date=2009-01-31 |publisher=Brill |isbn=978-90-474-2524-3 |editor-last=Mandelbrote |editor-first=Scott |page=450-454 |language=en |editor-last2=Meer |editor-first2=Jitse van der}}

Modern Young Earth creationists who reject Geocentrism have argued that the debate over Geocentrism and Heliocentrism in the 16th century arose not from a proper understanding of the Bible, but from the influence of Greek philosophy, critiquing the usage of verses from poetic books such as the Psalms to build a cosmological doctrine,{{Cite web |title=Geocentrism and Creation |url=https://creation.com/geocentrism-and-creation |access-date=2025-05-04 |website=creation.com |language=en-gb}} rather arguing that such passages employ phenomenological language, not what happens literally in nature.{{Cite web |title=The Rise of the Modern Geocentric Theory Movement |url=https://answersingenesis.org/astronomy/rise-of-modern-geocentric-theory-movement/?srsltid=AfmBOoqivSqVQcEEJDux-rNIoRlCNq94-lkSUA3xae0e0I1nsTizPDSn |access-date=2025-04-30 |website=Answers in Genesis |language=en}} Thus, they believe that while every claim of the Bible about the natural world is true, it should not be viewed as teaching geocentrism, as it only describes the rising of the Sun from our perspective as how it appears. Additionally, creationist critics have argued that the physical location of the Earth has no bearing on the theological idea that God's center of focus is the Earth.

From a Roman Catholic perspective, more mainstream Catholics have criticized those more radical traditional Catholics such as Sungenis and Solange Hertz for assuming that the Church ever made definitive statements in defense of geocentrism, additionally arguing that the early Christian theologians who held to a Geocentric view of the universe did not teach it as doctrine or as a part of the Faith but merely assumed it as a part of the science of their day, additionally criticizing modern geocentrists for using passages mainly from books like the Psalms, which are written in poetic style.

Old Earth Creationists, including R. Scott Clark, contend that the Scriptures are written by God in a way that accommodates human understanding, meaning that Scripture should not be read like a scientific textbook. In this perspective, the Bible communicates to us in terms people of the time could understand, rather than providing a detailed scientific account of the Universe and the natural world.

Geocentric creationism stands in contradiction to modern physics, particularly in its mechanics of motion: the model requires the entire universe, including distant stars and galaxies, to revolve around a stationary Earth—implying speeds far exceeding that of light. That the Earth orbits the Sun and Evolution have long been established by scientific consensus, despite being rejected by geocentrists. This thus places Geocentrism into the category of pseudoscience.

Category:Creation science

Category:Pseudoscience

Category:Modern geocentrism