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Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), a [[Protestant]] in [[Germany]], built on [[Copernicus]]'s work and discovered that planets orbited the sun in elliptical rather than circular orbits.  Kepler was a brilliant mathematician, astronomer and devout [[Christian]] who cited God many times in all of his writings.  He felt it was his Christian duty to understand the creation of God, the universe.  He also felt that man, being in the image of God, was fully capable of understanding the universe.  Like [[Plato]] and [[Pythagoras]], Kepler felt that God must have created the universe according to a mathematical plan.

Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), a [[Protestant]] in [[Germany]], built on [[Copernicus]]'s work and discovered that planets orbited the sun in elliptical rather than perfectly circular orbits.  Kepler was a brilliant mathematician, astronomer and devout [[Christian]] who cited God many times in all of his writings.  He felt it was his Christian duty to understand the creation of God, the universe.  He also felt that man, being in the image of God, was fully capable of understanding the universe.  Like [[Plato]] and [[Pythagoras]], Kepler felt that God must have created the universe according to a mathematical plan.

Kepler overcame an enormous obstacle to become a great scientist.  Kepler suffered from an attack of smallpox, a deadly disease, when he was only four years old.  This impaired him with poor eyesight and crippled hands for the rest of his life.  But he went on to propose three laws of planetary motion, known as Kepler's Laws, and these later helped Newton formulate the theory of gravity.  One of these laws described how the planets have elliptical orbits with the sun at one focus of each [[ellipse]].

Kepler overcame an enormous obstacle to become a great scientist.  Kepler suffered from an attack of smallpox, a deadly disease, when he was only four years old.  This impaired him with poor eyesight and crippled hands for the rest of his life.  But he went on to propose three laws of planetary motion, known as Kepler's Laws, and these later helped Newton formulate the theory of gravity.  One of these laws described how the planets have elliptical orbits with the sun at one focus of each [[ellipse]].