Religion and Science in the History of Tycho Brahe’s Cosmic Scheme

In 1588 Tycho Brahe (1546-1601) published a new cosmic system that combined Copernicus’s account of the planets with a Sun that rotated annually around the Earth. This system may seem ungainly today. But, in the absence of a physical theory competent to support a wholly Sun-centered system, it was no less plausible than other geocentric schemes. It had two major advantages. First, it continued to allow the use of accepted physics. Second, and equally important, it conformed with the received reading of the Bible on the nature of the cosmos, which also accepted a central, stationary earth. Tycho explicitly made both scientific and religious arguments in favor of the new system, including some that bridged the two categories (especially arguments on the size of the cosmos). This was a strong attack on Copernicanism, by a Lutheran, and before the Catholic condemnation in 1616. After that date Tycho’s system was widely adopted by Catholics, and continued to be popular among Protestants. Recent research has shown that Tychonism was taught at both Catholic and Protestant universities well into the eighteenth century. Especially in the case of Protestants, the support for Tycho cannot be reduced to religious obedience. In this paper I will trace this history and suggest that the persistence of Tychonism is an indication of a fundamental truth about science and religion in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: throughout this period natural philosophers expected their scientific and religious views to be complementary and mutually supportive.