Abstract
Johannes Kepler left an indelible mark in the intellectual environment of Rudolfinum Prague. Here he published his major works: Astronomia Nova and Dioptrice.
He meets a number of personalities here, such as Petr Vok from Rožmberk, Martin Bacháček from Neuměřice, Václav Budovec from Budova, and Jan Jesenius. Not to mention the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, for whom Kepler worked.
In Prague, Kepler formulates two of his three kinematic laws of planetary motion. In his work Astronomia Nova, Kepler argues for geocentricists who searched for biblical texts for their position.
Kepler opposes this and defends his heliocentric view by a thorough analysis of what he considers to be contemporary expression in the texts of biblical authors. Kepler is convinced - and the text in New Astronomy supports this thesis - that God created the world so that the cosmos is recognizable and intelligible.
It is the belief in the Creator that his geometric plan for the motion of the solar system is accessible by the light of reason. Kepler believed that he had discovered part of God's plan, which contained the mathematically defined structure of the cosmos.
The idea of natural laws as principles of cosmic body movements then played another role in the secularization and emancipation of the natural sciences from their philosophical and theological roots, which from the 17th century onwards ceased to play a key role in the epistemological and metaphysical basis of the natural sciences.