Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Book Notes: Live to Tell

    Kallenberg, Brad J. Live to Tell: Evangelism for a Postmodern Age. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2002. ISBN 1-58743-050-9. 138 pages.

    One of our pastors handed this book to my wife because of her interest particularly in discipleship. You may ask why one should give a book on evangelism to someone primarily concerned with discipleship, but in this case the choice was good. This book combines discipleship with evangelism so that they are practically one topic.

    Kallenberg has a certain amount of courage just writing a book right now with the word “evangelism” in the subtitle, and perhaps it becomes even more of an act of courage when the word “postmodern” is also included. That combination can be a bit intimidating.

    My wife found the postmodern vocabulary and the style of the book in general just too much to plow through. She’s practical, writes and speaks briefly, and likes to get down to the point where the rubber meets the road. Kallenberg doesn’t write that way at all. Since she also wanted to honor her pastor’s request to read the book, that made things a bit difficult.

    But a solution was lurking right around the corner, in the person of her husband who will read practically anything–me! We try to get together at least once a week to do some kind of joint study, generally studying from a book one of us has chosen, which we then discuss. In this case I read the book, summarized the chapter and then read selections, after which we discussed the content.

    The content of the book is really quite good, though the presentation and also some of the examples remind me of much that I don’t like postmodernism, especially as popularly conceived. That’s another concept, but I would simply note that it seems very easy for postmodernists to get mired in a slough without map or compass, without any idea of where to go.

    That very miring seems to provide Kallenberg with his “hook” to reach a postmodern generation. He is by no means rejecting postmodernism–the whole miring thing is my comment. Rather, if I may use my own metaphor, he aims at leading people out of the mire they’re in by example, rather than teaching them all about how to get out of mires, where the edges are, where the dangers are, and so forth.

    If we find someone in the postmodern age who doesn’t know where to go, he suggests we avoid the “teach them what is right” approach and try a “show them how to live right” method. I know I am summarizing a great deal here, but that is the essence of the subject as I read it. And since Kallenberg (and I) believe that Christianity has a story that is truly efficacious, that approach is best. If people are looking for stories, bring them a good story. Even better, show them a good story.

    Of course, this story idea isn’t anything new to Christianity. When God needed to tell us about himself, he didn’t send a systematic theologian. He sent his Son, who showed us in person and in story form just what God was getting at. As I read it, Kallenberg is simply grabbing a page from God’s play book and applying it to the life of the church today.

    Kallenberg presents this in the vocabulary of postmodern philosophy. Even where I find that postmodernism correctly criticizes modern thought, I find that vocabulary annoying at best. But the book isn’t really aimed at making me like the vocabulary. If I’m to communicate with people steeped in that very vocabulary, I’ll need to learn to understand it. In fact, Kallenberg uses this very metaphor of language learning for the process of conversion and discipleship.

    At the same time, he manages to erase the gap between the concepts of conversion and discipleship. Most of the people he uses as examples do not become Christians at some instant in time. The modern conception of conversion is that people becomes convinced that Christianity is true, that they are sinners, that Jesus is the one way to salvation, and then at some instant they pray a prayer and surrender their lives to Jesus. At that moment, discipleship begins, or at least should begin.

    In Kallenberg’s examples, it is much more likely that one will go to church and even participate in the life of the church before any specific “conversion” experience. What brings the person to Christ is their becoming a participant in the life of the church. In one case what convinces someone that God is personal is not theological argument but observing the congregation worshiping a personal God.

    I could wish that the many good points that are made in this book were divorced from some of the philosophical vocabulary. Perhaps there should be a Reader’s Digest version for practical people, but I’m not sure how one would write such a thing. There are so many elements of what Kallenberg is teaching that are simply good, practical ideas on being a good neighbor.

    But we have what we have, and for anyone who can make it through the first chapter, and occasional detours along the way, this will be a book well worth reading.

  • Critical Methods and Modern Tests

    Over the last few days there have been a flurry of posts at Language Log that could be related to Biblical criticism, though that is not the intent of their authors. What they are actually discussing is authorship identification and then spin spotting, with an interesting twist at the end.

    Here are some key posts to check:

    Why does this remind me of Biblical criticism? It seems to me that it demonstrates how easily one can be misled on things like this, and how important it is to thoroughly check such claims. It’s quite easy for an expert to say that, based on his careful study of certain criteria, a certain document was written (or not written) by a particular author. But when you go and ask for the basis of that claim, you may find that the expert has very little material with which to work.

    Noting that an author uses phrases that he doesn’t use elsewhere is significant if you have a large body of that author’s work. If you have only a small amount, you really have little to work with. Statistics work that way. You need significant samples before the numbers mean anything.

    I recall an experiment I did while a college student. I wanted to test my ability to decode something in a simple substitution cypher. I explained the process to my sister, and she created her cypher and then encoded some text using it. It was just a short paragraph, but I after an hour or so I gave up and asked her what it was.

    My problem? She had chosen a passage from Encyclopedia Britannica discussing the history of one of the Chinese dynasties. I don’t remember which, but the names of the emperors made all the probabilities off kilter. Even though the paragraph was in English, there were so many transliterated Chinese names that my probability charts were all off. I think I should have figured it out anyhow, but the fact is that I didn’t. A larger sample would have made the work quite trivial.

    Similarly the effort to automatically spot “spin” relies on sampling. Not every instance of the passive voice is intended to obscure agency, even if one correctly identifies the passive, as this program did not. One would have to find better criteria than simply passive voice.

    The ease with which some people are deceived on this is also very interesting. If someone talks authoritatively enough, provides enough technical sounding detail, people will tend to believe them. I think we build this view of expertise in many mystery shows today. How many people get their idea of what expert examination can accomplish from fiction? There the “expert” confidently points out a few items that make the case air tight. In reality, of course, such testimony will be placed in context, and alternative explanations will be provided by the defense. (See! I have indicated agency quite clearly in a passive sentence.)

    I like Biblical criticism, and I like to apply critical methodology to various texts. I’m not arguing against that. What I am suggesting is that in Biblical studies we generally have very small samples, and thus we are often drawing substantial conclusions from insubstantial evidence. You work with what you have. At the same time, we need to be very careful to state our conclusions with the appropriate humility.

    There are very few “assured results” in textual studies.

  • Using the NLTSB and NISB: Exodus 14:19-31

    Yesterday I looked at Romans 14:1-12 in these two versions. Today I’m looking at another of this week’s lectionary passages, Exodus 14:19-31. Those who aren’t seriously interested in these two study Bibles should probably skip this whole series. Watch for the first part of the title (Using the NLTSB [NLT] and NISB [NRSV]) and flee when you see it! Each of my notes will be short, however, so don’t panic.

    There is a greater difference in emphasis in this passage than there was on Romans 14:1-12. In that passage the theological themes emphasized in the notes were only slightly different. In this passage, we see more substantial emphases.

    Miracles: The NLTSB makes particular note of the miraculous aspect and comments that “. . . [a]s with the plagues, naturalistic explanations for this event are beside the point.” The NISB simply narrates the passage and looks at meaning without comment.

    Sources: The NISB notes differing interpretations of the rescue from Egypt according to sources. NLTSB does not mention this aspect. (This information involves reading beyond the limits of the notes on the specified verses, but such reading is necessary to place the notes in context for either edition.)

    Choosing Excurses: In the NLTSB we find an excursus title “A Hardened Heart” which deals with issues raised by the statement that “God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.” The discussion is really quite good, especially for the limited space provided and references a number of texts where one can look at the interplay between God’s sovereignty and human choice or human responsibility. In the NISB, there is also an excursus, but it is titled “Salvation and the Sea” and deals with the relationship between this passage and other ancient near eastern liturgy and symbols.

    I have a certain bias toward the emphasis of the NISB in this case, because I’m very conscious of comparative ancient near eastern materials, and I really like their introduction to the ideas involved. Apart from that bias, however, I would be hard pressed to call one of these better than the other. They choose different things to emphasize, but either choice is a good one and might be what a pastor or teacher would find most useful.

    Using these two study Bibles for a period of time is increasing my respect for both editions. I may have to add them to my reading more often!

  • Boon or Doom: Is That Really the Question?

    An article today on MSNBC.com asks the question:

    Will the Large Hadron Collider save the world, or destroy it?

    That, I think, is a major problem with the view of science held by way too many people. There are too reactions. First, we ask what it will do for us and how soon. Second, we ask whether it’s going to destroy us all.

    If we’re reasonably certain it won’t destroy us, then we don’t want to pay for it unless it produces immediate results.

    But knowledge doesn’t really work that way. Ideas that later turned into practical applications, such as radio and television, not to mention cell phones and various medical procedures (as noted in the MSNBC.com article) took a great deal of time to develop from much of the basic thinking and research that was necessary before they could become a reality. Nobody could have predicted what would happen when electricity was first observed.

    I’m reminded again of the comment by Henry Hazlitt in his little book Economics in One Lesson. He said that almost all errors in economics could be explained by looking at the problem over too short a term or over too narrow a range of people.

    If we are to continue scientific progress, money will have to be spent on things for which there is no immediate use. That’s what discovery is about, after all–discovering things. If they remain to be discovered, we don’t know what they are, and the scientists can’t tell you what they are. The have to find out.

    I expect neither salvation nor destruction tomorrow. I simply expect one very important new step in the gathering of knowledge.

    (Please note that the MSNBC.com article does not get hung up on the initial question. It does a fairly balanced job of discussing the issue. Personally, I had no intention of being balanced. Also, Peter Kirk wrote an interesting post on this today from a slightly different perspective.)

  • Using the NLTSB and NISB: Romans 14:1-12

    I thought it might be useful to look at the information available in each of these study guides for a few passages. Since I regularly read the lectionary passages during my personal devotions, I will compare the information available in each Bible for some selected passages from the current lectionary.

    I’m choosing to compare only the NISB and the NLTSB, because these two Bibles are the my most recent acquisitions, and also because they are the ones that interest me the most out of the numerous ones I consult.

    I chose Romans 14:1-12 today, and my post can be quite short, because there is remarkably little difference. The one surprise for me is that comments in the NLTSB use a few more words (around 600) than the ones in the NISB (a bit over 400). The layout makes the NISB look more dense, but the word count doesn’t bear out appearances.

    In terms of themes, both sets of notes are remarkably similar, even though one is largely from a mainline protestant perspective, and one evangelical.

    There are two divergences, though these are minor, and not contradictory. First, the NISB is at pains to point out that the adjectives “strong” and “weak” refer to faith, not character, which is, of course, part of the point. Second, in discussing the judgment based on days, the NISB says that “perhaps” this might refer to moving the Lord’s day from Saturday to Sunday, while the NLTSB makes the explicit statement “With Christ’s provision of salvation, observance of the Sabbath in its original form is not required of Christians.”

    Otherwise, had I chosen this text on which to base a sermon, I would glean pretty much the same outline points from it. Neither is comprehensive, but that is not expected in a study Bible. Both are solid in what they do say. I confess that in most areas I prefer the NLTse as a translation to the NRSV.

  • NCV Duct Tape Bible from Thomas Nelson

    There is some discussion of this edition of the NCV at Bryon’s Weblog (HT: Better Bibles.)

  • Added Bible Behemoth

    I’m not really too sure how this is going to work, but at a minimum, it will allow me to show links to a few Bible blogs that I haven’t even read. Thus, I have added a widget to my rightmost sidebar showing the last five posts featured on The Bible Behemoth (blog), the brainchild of David Ker of hippopotamus fame.

    Right now I can’t really manage to become a contributor, simply because I’m using my Google Reader account to test something else for my pages, and I would be favoriting a number of posts that would be quite inappropriate for the Behemoth, possibly even giving him (or readers) indigestion. I’m wondering if the Behemoth shouldn’t have some limit on the total number of contributors, but I will let the intrepid David figure out how it should work! He who ropes hippopotami can handle anything!

    In the meantime, however, I’m enjoying seeing what is posted there. Since I have become more systematic about reading I have been posting less; I thought I would be posting more. I hope to provide more useful content and better links in my sidebars as I play around with all these ideas.

  • When Prayer is Depressing

    One of the depressing things about prayer is just what will catch media attention. In this MSNBC.com article, we’re told about Stuart Shepard of Focus on the Family praying that it would rain on Barack Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention. I had seen this at the time, but it came back to my attention in the last couple of days as we discussed praying about hurricanes. I’ll get back to the hurricanes in a moment.

    The article notes:

    A couple of weeks before August 28th—the night that Barack Obama accepted the Democratic nomination for President, in a Denver football stadium—Stuart Shepard, the digital-media director of the lobbying arm of Focus on the Family, one of the most powerful organizations on the religious right, posed a question to his Internet viewers. “Would it be wrong,” he asked, “to pray for rain?” Shepard’s answer, apparently, was no, because he proceeded to do just that. He prayed for there to be rain—abundant rain, torrential rain, “rain of Biblical proportions”—in Denver on August 28th. “I’m praying for unexpected, unanticipated, unforecasted rain that starts two minutes before the speech is set to begin,” he said, adding, “I know there will probably be people who will pray for seventy-two degrees and clear skies, but this isn’t a contest.”

    It’s a good thing for him that he said it wasn’t a contest, because if it was a contest, he would have lost. But it also presents a depressingly bad picture of prayer. Is it any wonder that prayer has a bad reputation with many people. Praying is for kooks and bigots. It is supposed to serve to get us what we want and to make sure our enemies don’t get what they want. It’s supposed to provide us with special information from God so that we can be one up on our neighbors.

    And while I’m at it, let me detour to the silly response of many to Barack Obama making a speech before 75,000 (and actually more) people. If it was a Christian gathering, we wouldn’t think the speaker was crazy, or over the top, or egotistical (at least any more than is required for becoming president.) Barack Obama speaks well. He attracts large crowds. It was the logical action to take. There was no particular reason God should send rain on his crowd any more than any other.

    But the problem I want to address is the picture of prayer that all this type of talk presents. Prayers that curse certain people, prayers that wish harm on others, prayers that are simply said in order to get one some material benefit, are not really the kind of prayers that Jesus presented. Yes, I know he talked about faith and moving mountains, but one has to ask just how his disciples heard such things. We note that they neither moved any mountains nor did they complain that they couldn’t. People deride “spiritualizing,” but sometimes spiritual statements are, for some reason, spiritual.

    All this came back to me as Hurricane Gustav approached the Gulf Coast. Of course I would prefer that the hurricane not come to Pensacola. In my own very selfish way I like comfort. But at the same time, is there any conceivable reason I should pray that God send a hurricane over to New Orleans, which is largely below sea level, in order to spare Pensacola, which is largely above sea level, merely to spare my precious (to me) body, which is incidentally parked there?

    I think it’s silly, and even beyond that, nasty and thoughtless. Of course, I don’t actually believe my prayers steer hurricanes in any case. I think hurricanes follow God’s natural laws and go where they’re supposed to go. It would be much more constructive for me to pray that my own attitude toward other people would be changed, and that I would, in turn, change the attitude of many other people.

    In fact, I believe that change of attitude is the primary benefit of prayer. Somebody, somewhere is going to accuse me of not believing in the power of prayer because I said that. They’ll say I don’t believe in a supernatural God. I can always answer that I do believe God performs miracles sometimes. But that’s not the main point. I’m more interested in God performing the miracle of changing my attitude, which is continually in need of adjustment, and doing so on a regular basis. Personally I think that’s power!

    Yet many Christians in places that don’t get hit by a hurricane will be praising God that it missed them, while ignoring the people who got hit. I really don’t think most of the folks who do it actually have any bad attitude. They’re just thankful, and that’s good. But I think we need to be more conscious of the times when our good fortune means hardship for someone else.

    I recall one hurricane, though I can’t remember the name, that we thought might come to the gulf coast. Lots of folks were praying that it would go somewhere else. Well, it missed us, where it would have most likely killed a few dozen people, and it went to Central America where it killed a few thousand.

    Perhaps we should take greater consideration of the Lord’s prayer, praying for God’s will on earth, rather than our own, and of Paul’s admonition in Philippians 2:4, to look not after our own interests, but after the interests of others. That is, after all, what Jesus would do.

  • Comparing Study Bible Introductions to Luke

    A few weeks ago I began looking at the new NLT Study Bible, and indicated that I would use it and then comment as I went along rather than writing a review as such.

    Introductory Comments

    Since I’m looking at the manuscript for a new study guide to Luke that that I intend to publish, I decided to compare this study Bible with a few others that I consult regularly to see which was best suited for certain purposes. In this case, my primary purpose is making a recommendation to readers of the study guide who are generally expected to be serious lay Bible students, but not Biblical scholars.

    Some of the things I look for include coverage of the critical data, particularly the traditional critical methodologies of form, source, and redaction criticism. In Luke, we would look for some discussion of the synoptic problem. Of course we’re looking for the history behind the book, the date it was written, authorship, historical background, and some chronology. I would generally expect to find most of this in a mainstream scholarly study Bibles such as the New Oxford Annotated Bible.

    All of that can be interesting information, but lay readers are likely to want to get to the meat of the matter–for them, at least–and look at some applications. Here we look for discussion of overall themes and application of the material to a particular community. In this area also we’ll find the greatest variety of material. An edition may include devotional thoughts on the text, going beyond direct application to reflection.

    Finally there are the “extras,” maps, illustrations, charts, and cross-references. I list “cross-references” as an extra simply because almost all study Bibles have some, and there is quite a bit of variation in how these are done. I’m not going to get into much detail on that in this post.

    I’m going to leave the NLT Study Bible until last, since it is the focus here, and first write a little bit about each of the other Bibles to which I compared it.

    The Learning Bible (CEV)

    I frequently recommend this study Bible to new students, because it provides an introduction to some of the serious themes of Bible study with a minimum of pain. Some people might call both the CEV, on which this study Bible is based, and the style of the notes “dumbed down.” I would disagree. “Dumbing down” is a pejorative phrase that gets applied to a variety of materials, including material that is clarified for non-specialists. Writing for non-specialists always appears a bit weak to those more specialized in the field.

    The Learning Bible introduction to Luke includes material on authorship and date. It discusses sources in a very general way, but does not go into detail on critical issues. (There is some additional information in the introduction to the gospels as a group.) It spends the greatest amount of time on themes in the book. While it doesn’t get generally devotional, it does provide notes on application both in the introduction and in the early text of the book. There is very little chronological information.

    In terms of extras, there are extensive illustrations, carefully selected cross-references and a variety of notes with icons indicating the general category. The editors clearly made a serious effort to make this Bible user friendly. The one downside to that effort is that all of the material and its layout result in substantial volume, not likely one you’ll carry to church with you. It’s easily the largest of the study Bibles I’m comparing here.

    The Oxford Study Bible (REB)

    This is one of my personal favorites, both because I like the REB translation style, and because I find the notes helpful for the type of study I do quite frequently. You will find substantially more discussion of critical and textual issues in introductions and in the notes here, while you will find less application. Themes that are discussed are more purely exegetical and less in terms of application to the community. I find almost nothing in the notes that is devotional.

    In the case of Luke, there is little in the introduction to Luke on critical issues, but this is again covered more in the introduction to the four gospels together. There is less discussion of themes, the outline is less thorough than the one in the Learning Bible, but the notes are more detailed, and there is no effort to limit vocabulary. Illustrations are generally nonexistent, except for a few maps in the back, and there is very little on chronology in the gospels.

    I should note here that one would not expect any study Bible to be strong in all areas that I have laid out in my introductory remarks. Such a Bible would require multiple volumes. Different study Bibles are suitable for different purposes.

    New Oxford Annotated Bible

    I include the New Oxford Annotated Bible, not because it is one I use that regularly. (Note that I link to the more current third edition, but I’m commenting based on the 2nd edition that I have on my shelf.) I generally prefer my Oxford Study Bible. Rather, it is the required Bible for those studying for the United Methodist ministry, at least in our conference. (I’m not really well enough acquainted with the system to comment more generally, though I’ve gotten the impression this is pretty widespread.)

    In some ways it is more comprehensive than the Oxford Study Bible. It’s joint introduction to the four gospels is more extensive, and it discusses themes in more detail in the introduction to Luke. It discusses critical issues in some detail for the lay reader. It also includes more information on chronology. In general, however, I would make the same comment on the notes that I make on the Oxford Study Bible–they don’t get too much involved in application to the community as such. I personally like it that way. I’ll make my own applications, thank you very much! But for those who are looking for a shorter path to sermon outlines, it will not be as helpful as a couple of others.

    Holy Spirit Encounter Bible

    You may think this one is out of place in this list, and you’re right. I wanted to include a Bible that displayed the kind of devotional material that none of these other Bibles do. If you lead study groups or teach Sunday School classes, you will likely encounter students who use such Bibles. They are not bad in themselves, but I do believe there is a danger of imbalance in the themes of scripture.

    The Holy Spirit Encounter Bible approaches everything with the question of how this relates to the Holy Spirit. If you used this for a single study, looking for the Holy Spirit in scripture, that could be useful. Just avoid using such a Bible as your regular reading Bible.

    It should be no surprise that the introduction to Luke in this Bible includes no outline, no discussion of when the book was written, the character of the author, communities to whom it was addressed, or any critical issue. In fact, the introduction is titled “the HOLY SPIRIT in Luke” which follows a pattern used for all the books.

    Rather than notes in a variety of categories or reflecting backgrounds, you find in the first few chapters of Luke several “Holy Spirit Encounter Moments,” two “Anointed by the Holy Spirit” inset boxes, one on John the Baptist and one on Elizabeth, and finally a “Holy Spirit Encounters” page that is not even related to the passages in which it is situated, but rather refers one to 1 Corinthians 12.

    Now these things are not bad in themselves, but it reflects the directed, devotional approach of the Bible. A study Bible that emphasizes one theme should not be used as a regular study Bible, nor should it be used alone, because it points to the theme chosen by the editorial board, and not to the themes emphasized by the authors of scripture.

    (Note that while this sounds a bit hostile, I have actually enjoyed studying a number of things in this particular Bible. I’m cautioning, not warning away.)

    New Interpreter’s Study Bible

    I purchases this Bible only a couple of months before I received my copy of the NLT study Bible. I was hopeful that it would have some of the theological notes that I’m used to finding in the Interpreter’s Bible or the New Interpreter’s Bible, both of which I value in their own way.

    I expected essentially a New Oxford Annotated Bible with a little more theological reflection. I was wrong. This is not like either of the two “Oxford” Bibles I mentioned. It focuses on serious theological reflection. Of course, consider the word “serious” in the context of the space they have available. Nonetheless I think that for the available space, this is the best theologically oriented study Bible I have encountered.

    There is much more discussion of themes. Such references are there are to critical issues come in that context, but they are really few and far between. Outlines are more detailed than any of the editions I have discussed previously. There is some material on chronology and on these broader themes in the material in the back, but if you go straight to the book of Luke (or another book), you’ll dive straight into theological themes and some application.

    Despite, or more likely because of the reduced emphasis on some of the more traditional critical methodologies, literary issues receive more discussion. If I were trying to prepare a sermon and didn’t have time to dig through mountains of history in order to make up my mind, this would provide me with the shortest path from scripture to major points in my sermon outline, while still being faithful to good scholarship and theological reflection.

    It is based on the NRSV, which is not my favorite, but it is not a bad version, especially for those accustomed to the KJV tradition. It is also not designed for the casual student. One should not assume that the vocabulary is light, or the treatment superficial just because it is less technical in the historical and critical sense. It is shifted from critical and historical issues to more serious theology.

    NLT Study Bible (Finally!)

    I finally arrive at the study Bible that got me started writing this. All in all, the NLT Study Bible is in many ways a pleasant surprise. It’s not another “light” study Bible. It’s not a devotional Bible. Ignore the hype on the cover–it’s not a revolutionary breakthrough. At the same time, it is good.

    The layout is better, but note that you will get less information packed onto a page. My New Interpreter’s Study Bible manages to get much more packed into its pages, but it does so at the expense of readability. Nonetheless, for me, the NISB would win.

    When I turn to the introduction to Luke, I see a map of the region in which the story takes place, a short bullet point style outline of the book. The introduction is divided up into friendly headings that lets you find what you want quickly, and there is room to add notes in the margin. The contents are a blend of the historical, literary, and theological, along with a bit of devotional here and there.

    Rather than having chronology separated in an article in the back (NISB, for example), there is a brief timeline on the right hand side of the page. The theological approach is evangelical, but not extreme. The date cited for Luke’s writing is 65-80 AD (they use AD, not CE). The description of authorship references both written and oral sources, but also eyewitness accounts.

    The notes are also a mix of background, theology, and application, and again the layout of the Biblical text, cross-references, and notes is quite user friendly.

    Summary

    Overall, while my personal study habits will not be altered by much, I will find time to consult this Bible, and I also expect to recommend it to quite a number of Bible students who are perhaps beyond the Learning Bible, but don’t really want to get into something like the Oxford Study Bible or the New Interpreter’s Bible. I will also recommend it to evangelicals who might find constant disagreement with their study Bible to be distracting. The NLT study Bible is a good addition to the Bible edition market.

    I will continue my discussion of this Bible after I have used it some more in my personal study.

  • The Bible Does Not Contain Science

    Jason Rosenhouse has a post at EvolutionBlog responding to an essay by Owen Gingerich in Frye’s Is God a Creationist?.

    In that essay, Gingerich makes some interesting claims, suggesting some special advance information provided by God in the words of Genesis 1. Rosenhouse quite correctly comments and then asks:

    It’s people like Gingerich I don’t understand. He cherry picks two verses that he wants us to take very seriously. In verse three we find that God begins by creating light, and, hey!, that’s kind of like what modern cosmology says. Then he turns to the end of the stroy and tells us we should ruminate on the verse that asserts we were created in the image of God.

    And the twenty-three verses in between? Where the Bible enumerates, in great detail, a sequence of events that is utterly fictitious? Well, just ignore that part.

    And right there is my major problem with several approaches to apologetics in Genesis 1-11. There is a common thread of trying to preserve the idea that God somehow provided scientific knowledge ahead of time, and described the origin of the universe in ways that would not have been known to the ancient world in which this literature first appeared.

    Sometimes, as in young earth creationism, interpreters take Genesis at face value as narrative history (I discuss what I believe the actual genre is here, and then demand that reality conform to their view. When reality fails to play nice, they simply deny it, or claim that in the future we will find out they were right all along.

    At other times, old earth creationists try to find ways of reconciling the statements of the first 11 chapters of Genesis with science, not in the strict sense of scientifically worded statements, but in the sense that as a narrative history, they don’t contradict science. Rather, they can be viewed symbolically as going along.

    Finally, we have the approach of Gingerich, which is to claim glimpses of great scientific ideas in the prose of the chapter. Admittedly, this requires reading past a great deal, and requires some imagination, but that has not prevented numerous people from trying and from publishing what they believe they have found.

    When I deny scientific content in Genesis, I am frequently confronted by someone who has read somewhere how closely aligned Genesis is with science, and they will point to some area of agreement. But these areas of agreement, even if one has the imagination to accept them in the first place, are very small, very narrow, and are surrounded by areas that are puzzling at best from the scientific perspective.

    I would apply here a standard I demand in comparative literature and comparative religion: Compare both the similarities and the differences. I also use a related requirement to search out what is regarded as critical within either the piece of literature or the religion in question. For example, to an evangelical Christian who believes firmly in salvation by grace received through faith, and regards that as central to his faith, the fact that another religion teaches love is only a minor point of similarity. It doesn’t make the two religions equal.

    So in comparing Genesis 1 and 2 to science, it is not valid so simply list points of contact without also listing points of dissimilarity. One interesting thing here is that those who point out that “let there be light” is in one of many ways similar to the big bang do not also note the spirit of God, or God’s wind moving across the waters before the light appears. One has to posit a strange mix of symbol and literal physical data to make this work.

    When Genesis is compared to scientific data as we know it on a broad basis, looking for both similarities and dissimilarities, it doesn’t come out so well. In addition to looking at both, it’s a good idea to look for accidental similarities, such as information that would be common knowledge anywhere. A reference to sunrise and sunset in two distant cultures would not be regarded as evidence that they had communicated, for example, because both would have observed the same phenomenon.

    To support the claim that the Bible contains science, one would need to find statements of physical fact stated in a well defined and testable way, in other words, statements made the way scientists might make them. You may believe I am putting too high a standard here, but to use such a thing as evidence one must eliminate other explanations, especially more plausible ones.

    If one thinks that the “waters” in Genesis 1:2 make some sort of statement of the place of H2O in chemistry, an implausible suggestion on its face, one should also consider the place of the waters or the deep in related ancient near eastern creation myths. Is it more probable to assume that the statement came from an unknown chemistry, or that God chose to cryptically convey information, information that would not be recognized until it was discovered in other ways, or that the waters here come from the same pool of mythological symbols used throughout the ancient near east?

    For me, this issue settled into place when I started to read this material in the context of ancient near eastern literature. It is not surprising that even one of my professors in graduate school, a Seventh-day Adventists school and fairly strong on young earth creationism and associated interpretation, was extremely concerned that I would not see Genesis as coming directly from God in its current form.

    Reading Genesis as ancient near eastern literature worked. It fit. I didn’t have to explain numerous loose ends. It was also something that the original hearer and/or readers might well have understood. There really wasn’t anything left to explain.

    Over time I learned to read Genesis again as theology, and specifically as theology suited to its time. It expresses, in the context of ancient near eastern cosmology, the relationship between God and the universe. Even that expression is time and culture related.

    Now I don’t expect atheists to like my position that much better. I know that they generally look down on views of inspiration that don’t result in error free texts with hard knowledge. After all, why couldn’t God get it right? But I think a better question is why would God get it “right” in that sense?

    Spirituality involves communion with God, and the Bible reflects that communion as experienced by my community and its antecedents. Every piece of scientific information people claim to have gotten from the Bible can be found elsewhere, better expressed, and more reliable. But as a Christian this is the core of the experience of my community.

    That doesn’t provide me with the means to convince others that my (or our) scriptures are better than others. That would have to work through the lens of the community. But the attempt to find scientific data is sure to be a failure.

    Doubtless the Bible will get some facts about the physical universe right, but unless those facts are more than incidental, they demonstrate nothing, and high claims for them can only result in a negative judgment on the text in which they are found.