The Cambridge Companion to Science and Religion  . Edited by PeterHarrison . Cambridge , UK : Cambridge University Press , 2010 . xi + 307 pages. $24.99 (paper), $85.00 (hardcover).

The Cambridge Companion to Science and Religion is a welcome addition to the Cambridge series and a valuable contribution to the growing literature on science and religion. Sound in scholarship yet accessible to nonspecialists, this volume is rather more focused than its ambitious title might suggest. Edited by Peter Harrison, the Andreas Idreos Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford University and Director of its Ian Ramsey Centre, it collects essays from distinguished historians, philosophers, scientists, and theologians.

As befits the editor's own scholarship, the Cambridge Companion begins with studies of historical relations between science and religion in the West; most of these serve to debunk the perplexingly persistent “myth of conflict” in favor of more nuanced narratives. David C. Lindberg traces “The Fate of Science in Patristic and Medieval Christendom,” from Augustine's appreciation of Greek natural philosophy as “the handmaiden of theology” through its preservation and expansion in medieval monasteries and universities. Notwithstanding Tertullian's objection, “Athens” was often well received in “Jerusalem”—and more consequentially in Rome, Bologna, Paris, Oxford, and Cambridge. This sets the stage for “Religion and the Scientific Revolution,” in which John Henry examines varying receptions of early modern science in Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions—most notably among the Puritans. Jonathan R. Topham considers “Natural Theology and the Sciences” from Newton to Paley and beyond; he rightly observes that Darwinism did not kill natural theology, but more dubiously suggests that scientific professionalism and Barthian theology did. Jon H. Roberts carefully chronicles differing “Religious Reactions to Darwin” in Great Britain and the United States. The common European reaction, according to conventional wisdom, has been a decline in religious belief; but John Hedley Brooke cautions against any simplistic correlation between “Science and Secularization.” In America, liberal Christians have typically tended toward models of theistic evolution, while some conservatives have opted for “Scientific Creationism and Intelligent Design,” as detailed by Ronald L. Numbers.

The volume then turns toward contemporary relations between science and religion, illustrating a variety of disciplinary approaches. Evolutionary biologist Simon Conway Morris lifts a spirited toast to “Evolution and the Inevitability of Intelligent Life.” In “God, Physics, and the Big Bang,” cosmologist William R. Stoeger explores the import of both fine‐tuning and multiverse scenarios for theological understandings of creation. Psychologist Fraser Watts argues that theological anthropology can make a robust contribution to science in “Psychology and Theology.” Sociologist John H. Evans examines the power relations in expert and popular discourse about “Science, Bioethics, and Religion.”

The volume concludes with philosophical considerations. Michael Ruse defends methodological naturalism as essential to science but denies that this implies metaphysical naturalism in “Atheism, Naturalism, and Science: Three in One?” In “Divine Action, Emergence, and Scientific Explanation,” Nancey Murphy challenges causal reductionism and determinism in explanations of human freedom and divine action. Discerning a grand teleology, John Haught proposes a process theology as the framework for comprehending “Science, God, and Cosmic Purpose.” The volume ends where many such books might begin, with a methodological reflection by Mikael Stenmark on “Ways of Relating Science and Religion.”

Despite Harrison's judgment that “those with more than a passing familiarity with both science and religion have little time for the conflict thesis,” episodes of conflict nevertheless receive considerable attention. Inasmuch as the Cambridge Companion places greater emphasis on historical studies than do some comparable books, it would be enhanced by a chapter on the recent growth of scholarship in science and religion as an historical development in its own right. As Harrison acknowledges, the historical scope is limited to Western Christianity, Anglo‐American philosophy, and the natural sciences—a focus that may disappoint readers led by the title to expect coverage of other world religions, Continental philosophy, social sciences, or environmental concerns. Still, this fine companion welcomes company, closing with a brief but useful guide to further reading on some of these latter subjects as well as those specifically and superbly covered within.