Go to the internet or the history books (if there is such a thing in 2023), and you will find the name of Stephen Hawking. He was widely considered the greatest scientist of his generation. There is much to admire. Born in 1942 in Oxford, England, he overcame a debilitating disease (ALS) to gain a worldwide following for his ‘brilliant’ (an overused word if you ask me) work in theoretical physics. Hawking merged Einstein's theory of relativity with quantum theory to suggest that space and time began with the Big Bang and would end in black holes. If you decide to read about these ‘black holes’, you will be just as confused about them after reading as before. Keep in mind that Hawking was into THEORETICAL physics. Not really facts, but theories.
Indeed, if you read carefully, you will find in ALL the writings of Hawking and his kind the most prominent words are things like— ‘could be’… or ‘possibly’… or ‘we think’… or ‘maybe’. It also includes explanations of what previous smart guys like Newton and Galileo and Einstein got wrong.
The book that started his path to scientific stardom was “A Brief History of Time”, published in 1988. It sold over ten million copies. He had to revise the book often because new discoveries were being made all the time. He had to admit he had been wrong about some of his ‘facts’ and some of his ‘theories’. Indeed, the copy I recently purchased and read was published in 2017 and said on the front cover “Includes New Material”. I tried really hard to understand Hawkings’ ideas about the universe, space-time, gravity, black holes, the Big Bang, and even God. I failed. He was talking over my head.
This all led me to the internet to listen to some of his interviews and lectures. I started with Neil deGrasse Tyson, known as a “popular astrophysicist.” He has his own TV show and a big presence on the internet.
Tyson interviewed Hawking, almost drooling as he asked, “What was around before the Big Bang?” CLICK HERE to watch the interview.
"Nothing was around," Hawking told the audience on Tyson’s StarTalk. He told the audience that he uses a "Euclidean approach to quantum gravity to describe the beginning of the universe," which Hawking says happened 14 billion years ago. "The Euclidean space-time is a closed surface without end, like the surface of the Earth," he said. "One can regard imaginary and real time as beginning at the South Pole, which is a smooth point of space-time where the normal laws of physics hold. There is nothing south of the South Pole so there was nothing around before the Big Bang."
The oddest part of the interview was Tyson listening to Hawking and shaking his head, pretending to understand the nonsense that was coming from the “brilliant” mind!!! When I first saw it, it seemed like a skit from Saturday Night Live- but it was not. They were serious.
Hawking said “Nothing was around.”
Really? The big bang came from nothing?
You would think an easy answer for a smart scientist would be something like this- “Apparently God was around. I am not religious, and I don’t understand this God- but obviously something which many people call God was around.”
Indeed, everything that Hawking ever said about the universe and space and time was always in theory. And no one questioned him about it . They just oohed and awed at this person who spewed forth his theories.
The oohing and awing didn’t stop when he died at age 76 in 2018. His ashes were interred between the graves of Charles Darwin and Sir Isaac Newton inside Westminster Abbey in London. You have to wonder why and how an avowed atheist gets buried inside the ancient Abbey, founded in 960AD by Benedictine monks.
But even stranger than his resting place, a powerful antenna then beamed Hawking’s voice into space, aimed toward a black hole known as “1A 0620-00”. Hawking had spent much of his life discussing his theories about such dark holes.
The famous “1A 0620-00” (where no light can exist) is the nearest black hole to earth. Most of them are hundreds of thousands of light years from earth but this one is ONLY 3,500 light years from Earth. That means that whatever Hawking observed in this dark hole happened 500 years BEFORE King David lived on the earth (and wrote the words above from Psalm 108).
When Hawking died, Greek composer Vangelis was hired to set the physicist's voice to an original piece of music for the send off into space. The musical piece is about six minutes, with a voice-over by Hawking in the middle. CLICK HERE for the 6-minute musical message.
Ironically, even when the recording arrives at the black hole, it apparently will become locked just outside the black hole. And since black holes evaporate (so says Hawking) over billions and billions of years by emitting Hawking radiation (obviously named after the genius), the recording will eventually disappear thanks to this radiation. Is your head spinning yet?
Personally, I am grateful for my 2.9 GPA in high school, college and even law school. The smart guys, including Hawking himself, seem to have missed the obvious.
The insight of people like King David into the “highest heavens” had no cameras or Hubble Telescope or rockets travelling into space to tell him the obvious. He had never heard about Physics. Isaac Newton and Galileo and Einstein were way in the future. He had no PhD.
All David had was the common sense of shepherd boy who sat and watched the stars and knew that Someone bigger than him was out there as a Creator. And he also heard the voice of this Creator who would talk to him, revealing secrets of the universe and eternity that we still study today.
Hawking’s family standing inside Westminster Abbey, as they put his ashes into the floor.
So, finally, I need to comment on the role of Westminster Abbey and his family in his final resting place. His family issued a statement, "We are so grateful to Westminster Abbey for offering us the privilege of a Service of Thanksgiving for the extraordinary life of our father and for giving him such a distinguished final resting place." Exactly who are atheists thanking when they have a Service of Thanksgiving?
"We believe it to be vital that science and religion work together to seek to answer the great questions of the mystery of life and of the universe," said the Dean of Westminster, the Very Rev. Dr. John Hall, when the location for the internment was announced.
I understand where the “Very Rev. Dr.” is coming from. He sounds so rational when he says that science and religion should ‘work together’. But has he forgotten the obvious? Is he unaware that the light from the stars he watches at night were sent to earth before King David he wrote Psalm 108, or when when a baby was born in Bethlehem? God’s universe (indeed the smart guys say there are millions of universes) is so vast that the light from the stars we watch at night was sent our way before Jesus was born.
And instead of a final word about this magnificent Creator God……. I mean honestly, this magnificent Creator God… poor Stephen Hawking leaves us with a final humanistic message sent toward his famous Black Hole.
The following is a transcript of his message sent to the Black Hole.
“I am very aware of the preciousness of time. Seize the moment. Act now. I have spent my life travelling across the Universe inside my mind. Through theoretical physics I have sought to answer some of the great questions but there are other challenges, other big questions which must be answered, and these will also need a new generation who are interested, engaged and with an understanding of science.
How will we feed an ever-growing population, provide clean water, generate renewable energy, prevent and cure disease and slow down global climate change? I hope that science and technology will provide the answers to these questions, but it will take people, human beings with knowledge and understanding to implement the solution.
One of the great revelations of the space age has been a perspective that has given humanity on ourselves. When we see the Earth from space we see ourselves as a whole; we see the unity and not the divisions. It is such a simple image, with a compelling message: one planet, one human race. We are here together, and we need to live together with tolerance and respect. We must become global citizens.
I have been enormously privileged through my work to be able to contribute to our understanding of the Universe. But it would be an empty Universe indeed, if it were not for the people I love and who love me. We are all time travelers journeying together into the future. But let us work together to make that future a place we want to visit. Be brave, be determined, overcome the odds.
It can be done. It can be done.”
We finally agree on something.
“It can be done.”
Sadly however, we disagree about how it can be done. It will not be hard-working “human beings with knowledge and understanding”. God Alone has it all worked out. The Creator can be trusted. The God of the Universe has it all worked out and contrary to what Hawking or others believe, we simply are not smart enough to understand His ways.
Hawking also ends his message with a truth that the Universe means nothing without the people he loves and who love him. The sentiment is very true. He got that one right.
But I would argue that it is a half-truth. So-called love that excludes the God who IS love, may not be love at all. Somehow, Stephen Hawking failed to understand that it was God’s Love that gives meaning to it all. “For God so loved the world…”
It is God who loves Stephen Hawking! It is the same God who snapped his fingers and started the Big Bang. This same God was big enough for the Universe but small enough to enter his Heart.
I hope that he met this great God before it was too late. Hopefully, there is an untold story that Stephen Hawking’s questions about the Universe were all answered before he left this earth. The answer? GOD…!!!
“If you think you are wise by this world’s standards, you need to become a fool to be truly wise.
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God… The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise; he knows they are worthless.” (1 Corinthians 3:18-20, NLT)