This page will be updated from time to time to reflect the main developments in the efforts to give a pro-secularist voice greater visibility in academic biblical studies circles.
Some of us are planning to meet to talk about it at the November SBL meeting. If you want to join us, feel free!
New Orleans Marriott (SBL headquarters hotel) hotel at 555 Canal Street
at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 21
(Please Note, this is a change from the originally posted Friday night meeting). There will be more updates closer to the time.
The initial post that went out to the Yahoo Biblical Studies group and Facebook SBL and SOTS groups outlined some of the possible goals and purposes of any independent group formed by secular biblical scholars, or a “secularism and biblical scholarship” type session or consultation within the SBL.
It should be remembered that these ideas are only suggestions and do not reflect an established mandate for which we are seeking subscribers. At present, all is open for discussion.
Here are some suggested aims. The first three have already been proposed in the initial announcements and were, I believe, composed by John Loftus and Hector Avalos. The others are adapted from some of my earlier ideas.
AGAIN, feel free to add your own views and ideas in the comments section on this post!
1. Promote scholarship of the Bible from a non-religious viewpoint.
2. Produce scholarly critiques of religionist biblical scholarship, and how it functions to maintain the authority and value of the Bible in the modern world.
3. Form a counterweight to the Evangelical Theological Society, and perhaps engage in cordial dialogue and debate with its members through written formats and through joint sessions.
4. Draw secular biblical studies more closely into dialogue with the wider secular field of Religious Studies to allow easier cross disciplinary and cross cultural studies of human religiosity.
5. Provide a voice for secular knowledge of the Bible’s origins and history of interpretation for the media and those interested in the impact of biblical interpretation on political and other current issues.
6. Address pedagogical issues of teaching non-theistic biblical studies when a large portion of most library holdings mix theological and secular materials.
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In addition to discussion of the larger aims of such a group, there has been some discussion of specific themes for sessions. Again, feel free to suggest some of your own.
A. Philip Davies suggested that a session might address “whether ‘history’ has any intrinsic meaning or end-point (‘eschatology’ would, I suppose, be a more or less suitable label for this)”
B. Davies also suggests that secular scholars might be intersted in exploring “’inspiration’ as an explanation of the generation of literary works.”
C. The practical limits of a “Great Divorce” between theistic and secular biblical scholarship: e.g., academic isolation, institutional structures (J. Linville).
D. The Bible and mythology: i.e., myth in the Bible, and the Bible as myth in various religious communities through the ages (J. Linville).
E. Cross cultural examination of the phenomenon of books allegedly discovered or revealed and claimed to reflect the will of a deity (J. Linville).
F. Human evolution, the origins of religion and the transmission of biblical “memes” (J. Linville).
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If you are interested in discussing the viability of such a group within the SBL, or alongside the SBL, please join us on Saturday, November 21, 2009 at 6:30pm at the Marriott Hotel. Feel free to contact any of the organizers at the e-mail addresses below.
As I said above, please keep in mind that at present we are trading ideas, pros and cons, and do not have a mission statement or anything like that. None of the ideas above had been “vetted” by any committee, and I will not censor ANY serious comments made to this post (flames, spam, etc. will be deleted).
If your are interested in the “big picture” of secularism in academia, please have your say here or in some other venue.
Jim Linville (jimlinville@shaw.ca)
You may also contact any of the following, as well.
Hector Avalos (HectorAvalos@aol.com)
Ken Pulliam (pulliam@mail.com)
John W. Loftus (johnwloftus@verizon.net)
October 24, 2009 at 8:30 pm
If you promise not to tell anyone, I would be interested in seeing,
develop
October 24, 2009 at 8:52 pm
Unfortunately that is all he wrote at the moment and he gave me permission to post his ideas. I will see if he wishes to come and clarify things for us.
On the first point, I’m no philosopher of history, but I can’t see how the flow of global or regional events is anything but distinctly not teleological or meaningful, whereas the role of recording or transmitting knowledge of past events are primarily efforts at creating meaning. I suspect Davies has a lot more in mind, and hopefully he can share his thoughts here.
On the second point, it is interesting that the same term is often used to label the purportedly heavenly origins for a variety of religious writings as well as artistic works. I suspect a hold over from the Muses, the idea that fancy words have to come from outside. I think it is fascinating how a wide variety or religous specialists around the world see their poetry, et. al. coming from gods, spirits, etc. As the Gods Must Be Crazy might put it, “it is an interesting psychological phenomenon”.
October 25, 2009 at 9:08 am
Nah, see I can’t see a link on the side. Nobody can see it I’m sure except the Yahoo group and Joel who I sent the link to…
No 3 is potentially dangerous because it could lead to debate with extreme Christians rather than main stream Christans and it tends to polarise people. It puts me off coming.
No 4 is desirable – with extremists this doesn’t happen
No 6 what is wrong with mixing theological and secular materials?
It’s a real damn shame Philip isn’t coming to elaborate what he means by A. B is great.
I like E and F especially…
October 25, 2009 at 9:41 am
#3 is probably the most troublesome, since it names a specific society. The SBL shares meetings with a number of different groups. I would rather have the secular “special interest group” support specific ideas and methodologies and ideals rather than see itself as a counter to a specific group of people.
#6 is not so much a problem as a reality that is worth talking about as it does raise some pedagogical issues. A lot of support material for courses are quite conservative in outlook (e.g., BIble atlases), and i know from experience that students get into a muddle when they cannot properly contextualize the perspective of writers of commentaries and so forth. What I’m proposing is simply a discussion on helping students get the most of any book they happen to come across.
October 25, 2009 at 9:50 am
Perhaps you could rewrite Loftus’ (?) No 3 with agreement from them? Or delete it?
No 6 – oh I see.
October 27, 2009 at 8:39 am
Which blinking Marriott for kitty’s sake? There’s two!!!!
October 27, 2009 at 8:54 am
I’ve sent an email to the other folks, and hopefully they will answer soon.
October 27, 2009 at 9:04 am
It is the New Orleans Marriott (SBL headquarters hotel) hotel at 555 Canal Street.
the main post has been updated.
October 27, 2009 at 2:23 pm
Ah danke. Just across the road then from 614. Now, thinking about the session times ending at 6.30, you wouldn’t be thinking of changing the time to 7 would you? Or are you expecting some of us to be late?
October 27, 2009 at 2:48 pm
sorry about that. I’ve got the worst cold ever and I’m barely conscious. Had to cancel classes. I will work on it.
October 27, 2009 at 3:25 pm
OOOOOh! Poor you. Lots of miaows and sympathy and drink loads of lemon honey and whiskey
November 15, 2009 at 9:10 am
I’m a little late, but I’ll throw in my two pennies. #3 is a problem. NOT naming the ETS is like not naming the elephant in the room, yet naming it invites the illusion it’s the only SBL group involved in apologetics. I think “conversation” with them would be an utter waste of time, and would be useful only for giving the optical illusion of reaching out. The fact is, no one in either group is going to be persuaded of the others’ ideas. And the polite exchange of ideas is overrated. Crossley and Bird’s published example of this is a case in point. They are not playing the same game. One is playing basketball and the other snooker. Comparing the two games is utterly pointless: all they share in common is balls instead of bibles; each has its fans and its experts. Bringing them together is not feasible, nor desirable, and comparing them with the goal of persuasion is a lost cause (on both sides of the debate). This might sound like it’s fostering division, but I submit the ship sailed on that one long long ago.
November 15, 2009 at 9:44 am
I agree absolutely … nearly. I think the only way forward is to work independently, not of course ignoring their scholarship, but deliberate conversation has it’s limits and it’s superficial lip service to compatability. I think naming and meeting another group like this is perpetuating division, is unnecessarily confrontational and quite frankly distasteful. As an ‘atheist’ who has never believed anything at all ever ever, I’m not at all interested in debunking ‘Christianity’ – I’m only interested in the advancement of what we can learn. And what’s more, the use of terms such as ‘deluded’ may be accurate in some cases like Blitherington but they are never fruitful. That’s getting a bit off topic though…
basketball, snooker, Balls instead of bibles… hahaha
November 15, 2009 at 10:14 am
Jim,
I look forward to meeting you and the others Sat. night in New Orleans. While I am in agreement with all of the proposals so far, my background and John Loftus’ background may be different than some of the others. We were both trained in conservative evangelical seminaries and were both ordained ministers. We have now both left the faith and are non-believers (atheist and agnostic respectively).
Our goal with this new group is in addition to everything else that has been mentioned is to demonstrate that the evangelical view of Christianity fails for a number of reasons. In connection with this, I could see some of our members engaging in a debate with members of the ETS. This particular time of the year when so many Biblical and religious scholars are gathered together in the same city ought to allow for some top notch debates that would be extremely well attended.
I personally plan to spend a lot of time while in New Orleans at the Apologetics Conference sponsored by the Evangelical Philosophical Society. My purpose is to hear the very best answers that evangelicals have to offer so I can evaluate them from a position of strength.
Once again, I look forward to meeting you and the my fellow non-believers in N.O.
Ken Pulliam
http://formerfundy.blogspot.com
November 15, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Zeb: The bit I reserve my judgment on is the Crossley Bird book. It was aimed at those undecided, undergraduates and the like and for them I think it serves a purpose.
However I am beginning to feel less like I would be very useful as part of this group. Perhaps it is preparing to be an us versus them group. And I withdraw my self labelling as ‘atheist’ and remain instead, secular.
November 15, 2009 at 2:56 pm
I understand that people are coming from a lot of different backgrounds and perhaps want different things. Perhaps the way forward is to look at the context of our meeting at the SBL, what can be done there within the context of a meeting of biblical scholars, and the issues that we agree on need to be dealt with.
Any group we start cannot be all things to all people. I tend to see things through the eyes of a professional biblical scholar.
I’m most interested in helping steer SBL towards a stronger secular stance in its mission to foster biblical scholarship. I tend to see any debunking to be something of a sideline and not something that the SBL should be engaged in directly.
Of course, proper historical and comparative religions approaches undermine conservative (and some liberal) Christian teachings just as a byproduct of its critical analysis of things. Certainly we must encourage the SBL not to apologize for this and also to speak clearly and assertively when our work is being critiqued from theologically motivated perspectives that are foreign to secular critical scholarship. But that I see as something different from “debunking”, i.e., deliberately targeting the specific claims of a tradition for refutation.
I do see the point of challenging SBL’s affiliation with evangelical groups that really have little to do with the SBL’s mission as an academic organization. I am wary, however, of forming an “anti-religious” group as it could be argued that the SBL has as little in common with that as it does with, say, the Evangelical Theological Society.
November 15, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Debates between secularists and evangelicals, including the one between Crossley and Bird, always end up off-topic, veering off into metaphysics, and once they each as they must stake out their sides on that issue, the two sides cannot possibly learn from each other because they share nothing in common. But Stephanie, don’t conclude too quickly that you don’t fit in. It may well be me who does not, and I’m fine with that too. I’m the survivor of a failed attempt to foster secular biblical scholarship, so my baggage is a tendency towards a hard-nosed position.
November 15, 2009 at 3:04 pm
We could always challenge the ETS to a drinking contest. We might loose, though…
November 15, 2009 at 3:23 pm
I agree with both your comments Jim.
Zeb: I think you missed my point. I was talking specifically about one book which served minimal purpose, which was directed at undergraduates. It is helpful for the undecided as well as providing a useful demonstration of two perspectives, including the critiques by Maurice and Scott. I was not talking about live debates which I think are pointless and I agree they drift off into meta-all-sorts. I don’t see how any attempt to foster secular scholarship can fail if we just, well, just do it.
November 18, 2009 at 5:48 am
Jim,
I think you hit the nail on the head when you said: “proper historical and comparative religions approaches undermine conservative (and some liberal) Christian teachings just as a byproduct of its critical analysis of things.”
Just by virtue of doing sound biblical and historical research, we will undermine the ETS as well as other groups. So be it.
Ken