Inerrancy vs Responsible Scholarship (moral, Earth, Torah, gospel, Pentateuch)

[Jayhawker Soule]

The following editorial appeared in the San Antonio Express-News

Speak Out: Biblical study must follow rules of learning, not just faith

Web Posted: 09/03/2005 12:00 AM CDT

Rebecca Raphael Special to the Express-News

The August 1 AP headline might make one scratch one's head: "Clergy group attacks Bible study course in schools." Why would clergy attack a Bible course? Isn't that the ACLU's job?

The Texas Freedom Network, a non-sectarian religious freedom organization, recently issued a report on a textbook for elective Bible courses in public high schools. Professor Mark Chancey, an SMU Biblical scholar, found that the National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools' textbook advances religious claims, and not just any religious claims, but those characteristic of conservative Protestantism. The controversy raises the question, Can the Bible be taught academically?

Of course. Biblical scholars do it every day.

How? Is a course acceptable if it is non-sectarian? Non-sectarian indicates the absence of religious doctrines specific to one sect. But absence of sectarianism does not assure the presence of academic quality. The Supreme Court's distinction between teaching religion and teaching about religion points to the framing quality of academic approaches. What makes something "about"?

The academic frame is empirical and public. It deals with human experience, by methods that are also within human experience. Who wrote the Gospel of Mark, and when? The question is historical. It's the same kind of question as who wrote Hamlet and when.

So we look at documents, references to historical events, citations in other sources, the stage of the language, and similar matters. Were Mark or Shakespeare divinely inspired? To answer that, one would have to stand outside of experience and observe God at work. Academic biblical studies doesn't claim to do that.

Academic study also avoids foregone conclusions. Instead of investigating all relevant evidence, weighing it fairly, and considering alternatives, the foregone conclusion advocate selects only what fits what he already believes.

This mistake cuts us off from real knowledge and imprisons us within our opinions. Biblical scholars don't set out to debunk the Bible. Neither do they set out to prove its literal inerrancy.

Debunking and proving are both foregone conclusions: One assumes before investigation that the Bible is always wrong, and the other that it's always correct. No Bible curriculum that assumes inerrancy can be truly academic. It's not because the subject is the Bible, but because academics never get to assume the inerrancy of anything.

But aren't some claims about the Bible beyond question? Someone who removes the Bible from inquiry advocates a double standard, with one set of rules for one thing, and another for another, when the things in question are of the same type.

The U.S. Constitution in some places acknowledges the existence of slavery, and in another place prohibits it. What would a Martian archaeologist think? If her society also has laws, she would probably infer that these Americans had changed theirs.

The Torah (Pentateuch) in one place allows earth altars and in another bans all worship outside of a central shrine. Same inference: Worship practices changed.

That conclusion may unsettle some religious beliefs, but intellectual honesty demands that we don't change the rules for our favorites.

Here I warn of two red herrings. First, this debate is not about whether people have the right to believe anything in particular. Americans can believe whatever they want, no matter what experts think. We are also free to embrace faith claims that go beyond what any academic inquiry can demonstrate.

But liberty doesn't guarantee academic legitimacy. Anything taught in schools must meet a higher standard than merely falling within the scope of our liberties.

Finally, this debate is not about whether the Bible is worth studying. Biblical scholars master languages, history, and scholarship, and then devote their careers to teaching and research in the Bible. Of course we want people to study it. It's one of the foundational texts of western culture, on the short list of books that any educated person should know.

Most Catholic, mainline Protestant, and Jewish clergy learn academic biblical studies along with the interpretive traditions of their own faiths. Both scholars and clergy know that the Bible is the hardest book to read because it's the hardest to see: People see in it only themselves and whatever beliefs they hold dear.

Academic study of the Bible, with its focus on close reading and empirical argumentation, can ameliorate this biblical narcissism. Once we know that the Bible is not our magic mirror telling us that we're rightest in the land, we become aware of our activity as interpreters. And once we know that interpretation is active, not passive, then we are morally responsible for how we read.

[Sunstone]

That's an interesting concept, that "...we are morally responsible for how we read."

[Terrywoodenpic]

A very good article, though where would the unbiased teachers come from if it were put into practice. The various religions teach their own interpretation, not academic reasoned learning and arguement.

Terry
__________________________
Amen! Truly I say to you: Gather in my name. I am with you.

[michel]

An excellent article, and very thought-provoking; as Terry says, I would find it hard to imagine that this could be put into practice without there being a new 'Genre' of totally unbiassed teachers.


Michel

[Bright-ness' Shadow]

Totally unbiased religious teachers would be atheists - let me at 'em

[Fluffy]

Totally unbiased religious teachers would be atheists - let me at 'em

lol? *unsure whether this is a joke or not*

[chlotilde]

Originally Posted by Terrywoodenpic

A very good article, though where would the unbiased teachers come from if it were put into practice. The various religions teach their own interpretation, not academic reasoned learning and arguement.

No such thing as unbiased…everything comes from some point of view. Some people think that only an outside observer can form an unbiased opinion…but now his point of view is from the outside, not the inside, isn’t it?

[Jayhawker Soule]

I believe that there are many, many theist scholars more than capable of teaching such courses.