Maimonides on Ridiculousness of Beliefs Contrary to Science

It is important for you to know that there are three classes [of thinkers] who differ in their interpretation of the words of the Sages, of blessed memory.  The first class comprises the majority among those that I have come across and whose compositions I have read and of whom I have heard.  They understand the words of the Sages literally and do not interpret them at all.  To them all impossibilities are necessary occurrences.  They only do this because of their ignorance of sciences and their being distant from [various] fields of knowledge.  They do not possess any of the perfection that would stimulate them [to understanding] of their own accord, nor have they found someone else to arouse them.  Therefore, they think that the intent of the Sages in all their precise and carefully stated remarks is only what they can comprehend and that these [remarks] are to be understood literally.  This is despite the fact that in their literal sense some of the words of the Sages would seem to be so slanderous and absurd that if they were related to the uneducated masses in their literal sense, and all the more so to the wise, they would look upon them with amazement and exclaim: ‘How is it possible that there exists in the world anyone who would think in this manner or believe that such statements are correct, much less approve of them!’  This class is poor [in understanding] and one should pity their folly.  In their own minds, they think they are honoring and exalting the Sages, but they are actually degrading them to the lowest depths.  And they do not perceive that, as God lives, it is this class of thinkers that destroys the splendor of the Torah of God into saying the opposite of what it intends to convey.  For God said in His perfect Torah: This is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes and say: Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. [Deuteronomy 4:6]  But this category [of thinkers] expounds the words of the Sages in their literal sense so that when the nations hear them, they will say:  ‘Surely this small nation is a foolish and degenerate people.