Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Academic Freedom and Creationism in SciAm

    Glenn Branch and Eugenie Scott have an article in Scientific American titled The Latest Face of Creationism in the Classroom, detailing the latest approach to getting creationism in the classroom.

    Since I touched on this briefly in two previous posts, I thought I’d link to this longer article so people can get the context. I really don’t have the patience for detailing these legislative strategies, so I’ll let others do it.

    Enjoy!

  • The Arrival of a Creationist Troll

    Someone calling himself “island” has arrived to comment on my previous post (Teaching Evolution in Florida).

    He has descended to calling me a liar for the liberal agenda, which I will gratefully add to my other titles, and gotten there all within one day. Head over to the thread if you wish to talk. As is my usual policy, I don’t censor comments, but once I regard a conversation as a waste, I simply drop it.

    Don’t feed the trolls? Or do, as you wish. Or perhaps other trolls will join!

  • Obama Regards Himself as Liberal

    Terms like “bipartisan” and even “post-partisan” were employed throughout the campaign and are being used now in criticism of the Obama administration that is taking shape.

    The problem is that we have gotten used to the notion that bipartisanship involves people from two parties who happen to agree on an issue working together. Thus moderate Republicans and Democrats can get together on points on which they can agree, and that is regarded as “bipartisan.”

    Trouble is, neither party has a very coherent ideology, and thus there are always issues on which people who already pretty nearly agree can get together. There is a virtue in ignoring unimportant labels in order to work together on common goals.

    I honestly didn’t believe it during the campaign, but President-Elect Obama seems actually to have meant bipartisan. Not merely as in Republican and Democrat, but as in conservative, moderate, and liberal, as in people who actually disagree on substance having an input and a part in the process.

    That’s much harder to do, and it involves reaching out to people with whom one disagrees. The complaint has been that Obama has done too much reaching to the center and the right hand side of the spectrum.

    But it seems to me that the president-elect regards himself as a liberal, and thus any reaching out would involve reaching out to those on that side of the spectrum. He expects to set policy, as he has indicated in answers to the press, and to have this team carry it out. He will be listening, however, to a variety of voices.

    This doesn’t involve merely adding a couple of Republicans of moderate persuasion to an otherwise Democratic cabinet. It involves putting people who disagree substantively in a position to be heard by the president.

    I don’t know how this is going to work. If the president-elect is less of a leader than he thinks he is, the result could be disastrous. On the other hand, if he is capable of directing this group of leaders he has put together, which strikes me as a bit like herding cats, he could accomplish something quite extraordinary.

    Only time with him in actual power will tell us what the result will be, but I would say that I am more optimistic today than when I cast my vote.

    There are some issues on which the cabinet concerns me, particularly the Iraq war, torture, and certain constitutional issues in domestic counter-terrorism. I will continue to watch these issues, and to hope that Obama’s view, as expressed in the campaign, is one he can see through with the team he has assembled.

    But overall, think there is much cause to hope this coming administration will be better than I expected.

  • Loving, but not Recommending, the REB

    There has been a good deal of talk in the biblioblogosphere about translation theory, and in connection with that support for the REB.  In particular, I would note John Hobbins post Why the REB is a Great Translation, and to his earlier posts (not directly on the REB but very relevant to this post), You need an excellent translation to understand the Greek New Testament, and Critique of “Natural English” as a Goal of Translation.

    I’m not going to respond in detail to these posts.  I think I’ve made my translation philosophy, such as it is, clear previously.  But it’s interesting to me that I can disagree quite profoundly with John Hobbins’ view of translation, and at the same time personally prefer the REB.

    But the answer is right there in my phraseology.  I prefer the REB, but I eschew terms such as “the best translation.”  The problem I see here is that such statements tend to ignore the audience for the translation, and at the same time prescribe goals that audience should have.

    For example, John presents some rather admirable goals in terms of literary allusions and quality, as well as in terms of understanding the source language.  As I always do about this point, let me simply note that if one wants to get the nuances of the source language, the only answer is to actually learn the source language.  This is something Hobbins has done, and done well.  But at the same time he thinks this will somehow be made widespread through a particular approach to translation.

    The problem, in my view, is that many people will miss these subtle, and even not-so-subtle, literary characteristics.  I believe most will miss them, but can’t prove it as I’m working from personal experience.  In my experience teaching Bible classes to lay people, I have found that there is a distinct limit on what you can expect people to do.

    This is not because they are stupid; it’s because they have other lives.  They don’t spend most of their time studying this sort of thing.  In general, when I point out details, people are happy to listen, but this doesn’t become a regular part of their Bible study.  In the best cases, such things come to them through commentaries.

    I would note the happy exception of my mother, who chose on retirement to learn to read both Greek and Hebrew.  She’s now 90 years old and continues to use both in her own devotions.  But I will note that she did this after retirement, though her retirement is a quite active time in her life!

    I think it is arrogant of me to expect people in general to learn my field or expect them to have the same goals that I do in Bible reading.  For some, the target will be reading for a general message, without concern with details.  For others, literary beauty will be the main issue, and literary beauty is in the reader’s eye or hearer’s ear, despite centuries of “experts” trying to make certain literature “good” and other literature “bad.”  (J. K. Gayle provided an interesting post on this.)

    For yet others, the issue is to get to the forms of the source language, and while I recommend that they learn the language if that is their goal, a more word for word translation will help in a limited sort of way.

    So how does this relate to the REB?  Quite directly.  I love the REB.  I read it regularly.  I think it does overall the best job of translating the Bible in well-formed literary language.  That is something that I personally like.

    But other people function differently than I do.  A literary translation may actually be a distraction for them in devotional reading.  I note that some congregations I’ve worked with find the REB not that easy to follow when read from the pulpit.  (It shares this characteristic with some other translations like the ESV or the unfortunately NKJV.)

    Now each of those translations has some things in its favor, though I find the NKJV the hardest to justify, but they also have drawbacks.  It depends on who is using the translation, including when the “who” is a community, and what they are using that translation for.

    I see no reason to be prescriptive here.  One simply has to match the characteristics of a translation with use and user, as far as possible.

  • Book: Bobby Flay’s Grill It!

    There isn’t a better grillmaster than Bobby Flay. If you like to grill or you would like some tips to better grilling, this is the book!

    The book begins by discussing grills and tools and condiments. I like Bobby’s simple and realistic recommendations. Then each chapter discusses each item that can be grilled (asparagus, beef, shrimp, chicken, etc), what to examine when shopping, and then how to basically grill the item …”perfectly”! The recipes are easy to follow and include wonderful dipping sauces. This book is definitely on my Wish List.

  • Before Complaining about Corporate Taxes

    . . . consider this note. Many of these corporations don’t actually pay the rate specified, for the very good reason that there are many special loopholes.

    This is redistribution, but in which direction and for what purpose? Yet we’re “redistributing” even more via bail-out money. And to those Republicans who will blame this on the Democrats, the biggest and very poorly managed bail-out was passed under a Republican president, and some of the most irresponsible suggestions were made by a Republican candidate.

  • Teaching Evolution in Florida

    Brandon Haught of Florida Citizens for Science has started a series of posts on the history of the creation-evolution controversy here in Florida.

    In the new year I intend to spend a bit more time on Florida issues and even on county issues (Escambia County in northwest Florida), so you can watch for (and possibly ignore if you’re not from these parts) posts with those tags.

    I expect there to be bills on this, probably falsely called academic freedom bills, introduced into the next legislative sessions, and I will comment on them and track them here on this blog.

    It’s interesting to note how advocates of creationism in the schools have gone from bills forbidding that evolution be taught to “academic freedom” bills. Evolving strategy, eh?

  • Dialogue with Those Who Agree

    Two blogs I read regularly provided contrasting responses to Barack Obama’s choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration.

    First, Michael L. Westmoreland-White, who speaks from the left, expresses some anger because he sees Warren as someone whose views are opposed to those of many who made Barack Obama’s candidacy possible. As is usual, Dr. Westmoreland-White nuances his position and expresses it gracefully, even saying that some on the left would be willing to go along with the inclusiveness if Warren were giving the benediction, when many will have tuned out, rather than the invocation. I can understand that viewpoint.

    On the other end of the spectrum, Drew, guest blogger at Pursuing Holiness, thinks that Warren should refuse to give the invocation, because he is tacitly approving Obama’s “immoral” positions, citing particularly gay marriage, abortion, and even tax policy. To accurately reflect the flavor, let me quote:

    1 Corinthians 5:11 doesn’t explicitly mention “murder” or “stealing” or “blatant heresy,” but nonetheless…Warren should certainly hesitate before tolerating Obama’s gross immorality.

    It’s not my purpose here to debate these issues, but I should note that I would certainly not make it through Drew’s morality filter, and in fact I don’t think that he has expressed a particularly Christian filter at all. I define “Christian” as one who places one’s trust in Jesus, not as one who takes a particular set of positions on public policy.

    Though I’m clearly closer to Dr. Westmoreland-White’s position, my concern with both of these posts is similar in nature. I think we have a strong tendency to propose dialogue largely between groups of people who agree totally.

    Considering that the left, not to mention much of the center, has not had a seat at the table for the Bush administration, it is not surprising that many not on the right want to grab hold of the power and exclude the excluders. It is also doubtless difficult to carry on dialogue with those who regard you as grossly immoral, which is the position in which the GLBT community is placed.

    At the same time the challenge for Obama is to make whatever changes he can accomplish in Washington last more than one term and even more than two terms. In order to do that, he will need the support of opponents, and he will need to draw in more people. As such, his supporters might consider giving him more room.

    But from Warren’s point of view, I think it is important for him to have a voice. I don’t think that offering an invocation indicates support for all the moral positions of the person, group, or event in question.

    Dialogue needs to be between people who disagree. Bipartisanship needs to involve more than one party. Obama seems to be interested in both dialogue and bipartisanship. Let’s give him a chance to demonstrate an ability to lead in the midst of a chorus of diverse voices.

  • Inane Comments in the Orthodox Study Bible

    I’ve complained previously about the translation used in the Orthodox Study Bible, but I reserved discussion of the notes for later.

    Before I complain, however, I want to note that I have found quite a number of comments that I regard as helpful. My study has been enriched by using this Bible.  At the same time, I am frustrated by the number of cases in which it could be so much more enriching than it is.

    So herewith a small and perhaps nitpicky complaint–notes that actually add nothing to the text.

    I was reading 2 Samuel 7:1-11 for my lectionary study, and checked the notes.  The passage is the story of how David finds himself living in a house of cedar, but God’s house is a tent, so he wants to build a temple.

    The note on verses 1-3 reads:

    David has united the tribes under his kingship, established Jerusalem as his capital, and lives in a house paneled with cedar.  The ark, though now brought up to the city, remains in the taernacle he pitched for it, a tent.  He seeks advice from Nathan the prophet, who instructs him to build a temple for the ark.

    Umm, wasn’t that approximately what the text just said?  The only thing added is where the capital is.  The next note begins:

    In a dream, God informs Nathan . . .

    And you guessed it, we get the next several verses summarized.

    There is much that this Bible does, but so much more that would be possible.  The notes are quite variable, ranging from profound, especially when they bring the eastern church fathers into the mix, all the way to completely inane such as these two.

  • Christian Carnival CCLV Posted

    . . . at Parableman.