Georgia Moves Closer to Approving Classes Based on Bible

Parent Cafe
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<p>“Not many consider religion a plague”</p>

<p>Based on this simple tennet, Practice your religion in peace, Do not force me to practice it as well. If you believe in six donkeys and a goat, fine. I believe in 5 puppies and a kitty, so leave me alone. </p>

<p>There’s alot of room for tolerance, but like the salesman who won’t take “no thank you” for an answer, fundies tend to push the issue to incite anger and distrust. </p>

<p>The problem for this concept in classes is simply we cannot “trust” the class to be taught as brought about.</p>

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<p>Dorothy, in one sense I agree with you completely. I suspect you and I could have a lot of fun discussing the Bible. I think it’s tremendously important not to abandon the field of Biblical interpretation to fundamentalists (and I don’t think I have), and I also think it’s tremendously important to respect the Bible, the value that people have placed on it, and the fact that it means more than any other text in existence to millions of people, some of whom may be in the room at any given time. Also, to respect the possibility that many people will change their minds about it once or twice over the course of a lifetime. My fantasy high school Old Testament class would start with a basic ground rule of respect for the beliefs or non-beliefs of everyone in the room, and people out of the room, too.</p>

<p>But. Politically, I don’t see how a state with a huge, politically active fundamentalist community can legislatively mandate the offering of Bible classes in schools and not have the idea be to say “This is True. You have to learn it because it’s True. God said so.” It’s not that I see absolutely no value in that – after all, over the centuries most people have been taught the Bible that way, and many of them have been capable of forming their own conclusions notwithstanding. I don’t think Georgia teenagers are going to be inducted en masse into some kind of cult if they’re not already in it. I do think, however, that offering such a course in the public schools, even as an elective, essentially disregards the past 50 years, at least, of constitutional understanding of the Establishment Clause. Nor is there any real need for it – “The Bible Is True” classes are widely available outside of school to any teen who wants to take them (or whose parents make the decision for them). Most teens, I suspect, have a fair amount of Bible study under their belts by the time they leave high school. Maybe not in New York City or its suburbs, but in lots of places.</p>

<p>I think you also ought to distinguish more carefully between the cultivated secular cynicism of Northeastern establishment institutions, with which you may be personally familiar, and the environment in lots of the country, including most of Georgia, where the loud and vocal majority hold the Bible in supreme respect and demands, in myriad ways, that you join them. Maybe, as a pedagogical matter, the students at, say, Williams, should be required to study the Bible some, but making Bible study a public school “option” in the Bible Belt means sticking some poor Jewish, atheist, Muslim, or even Catholic kids into a gigantic vise and closing it up.</p>

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<p>cgm:</p>

<p>Actually, I would have a BIG problem with teaching the Bible as history. Most of the “historical” information prior approximately to Isaiah is of dubious validity as evidenced in the archeological and historical records from other civilizations that existed at that time. As history, I believe, with some justification, that the books of the OT prior to Isaiah are less accurate than the Iliad.</p>

<p>simba: </p>

<p>I actually made that point earlier in this thread which led to a straw man attack and my blocking WashDad. No, I don’t think they’ll be able to pull this off in Georgia. I think it is most likely to end in a lawsuit. However, I have no issue with teaching aspects of the Bible in theory. In theory, it’s very useful.</p>

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</p>

<p>It wasn’t a straw man argument, and Tarhunt ignored my request for clarification. I’m kind of impressed that I’m in Tarhunt’s killfile. I don’t think anyone on the 'Net has killfiled me since 1998. I’d like to thank the members of the Academy…</p>

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<p>First,</p>

<p>JHS,
I believe we agree, in the main:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>The reason fundamentalist run the religious-table in American public life is that the effete intellectual, as is their wont, does not want to engage the debate on traditional culture and sacred text and myth in the public sphere any more than to say something like, ‘you’re barefoot and ignorant…hillbilly’ (as above).</p></li>
<li><p>This behavior is not only intellectually lazy, but a tired affectation of “intellectuals” who need to maintain their rep of being secular-cool to the core as they reinvent what it means to be a human being–as if they were the first man on earth.</p></li>
<li><p>Georgia is what it is; and if there are singular obstacles in the state someone needs to rise to the challenge–beyond the ACLU trying to ban everything in sight: chicken little.</p></li>
<li><p>No one: absolutely no one can understand literature/culture/Western Civ without a working knowledge of the spiritual/cultural tradition that grounds it. Period.</p></li>
<li><p>The authorship of the bible has no relevance to a survey course of the bible; just as the tired debate over the “real Shakespeare” or “real Homer” has no relevance to a survey course on the two Bards (if they existed).</p></li>
<li><p>There are, I am quite certain, more than enough atheists, agnostics, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and religious slackars to balance out the knuckleheaded fundamentalists–even in Georgia–in an elective course.</p></li>
<li><p>Every argument presented against offering a high school elective into the literature of the bible (the most important literature within the Western Canon) is a straw man intended to stop the debate before it gets started.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>.</p>

<p>Last, but by no means least, I simply love the drama of those who are given to “block posters” (see no evil…it offends their sensibilities, one presumes) while nonetheless feeling the need to advertise the fact that they are actively doing so and in so doing engaging them, as if it makes them special, and the “blockee” blocked a pariah. Everyone’s a victim.</p>

<p>If you blocked a poster, fine, but put a cork in it.</p>

<p>.</p>

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<p>From Dottie’s mouth to G-d’s ears. </p>

<p>Actually, when you define all the “atheists, agnostics, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and religious slackars” (sic), you seem to be lumping the rest of the Christians with the fundamentalists. Why is that? I know there are a lot of Christians who take great offense by the overrun of the fundamentalists and their political agenda.</p>

<p>All Christians are not fundamentalists. This is what they say, so let’s watch the lumping.</p>

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<p>The most interesting college classes I ever took were religious studies classes, evn though I am an agnostic. In one class, there was somebody who just felt he had to interject a “Isn’t God great?” every few minutes until the instructor told him to pipe down.</p>

<p>Of course, this was in a public university out in California. It will be interesting to see what happens when somebody as devout starts sermonizing in a Georgia HS class.</p>

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<p>tarhunt let me clarify</p>

<p>What I mean by "history"is what people have done TO the Bible and WIth the Bible, ie land, borders, using it to justify certain acts, etc</p>

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<p>Dadguy:</p>

<p>Same here. I had a religion course as an undergrad, and it was one of the most fascinating courses I ever took.</p>

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<p>cgm:</p>

<p>Thanks for the clarification. Sorry I misinterpreted.</p>

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<p>As for who wrote the bible not being relevant to this type of study, of COURSE it is</p>

<p>Its like studying poetry without knowing the context of the poem</p>

<p>The bible is stories, and where those stories came from and who penned them is of course important</p>

<p>For instance if you are comparing a story that Shakespaere uses, do you just go to the biblical text, or do you go back further, to the possible orignial story</p>

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<p>Tarhunt, tis okay</p>

<p>The history is important, when you look at the middle east, how people read the bible and interpret it has created quite a bit of discourse when it comes to what is happening today</p>

<p>As well, when the 12 tribes of Israel are discussed, that also raises lots of questions</p>

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<p>“As for who wrote the bible not being relevant to this type of study, of COURSE it is”</p>

<p>I agree…I mean, you COULD teach a class on Dickens without talking about who Dickens was, why he wrote the way he did, what aspects of his life experience informed his observations, etc. But that information is unquestionably relevant in the eyes of most English professors, because most of them include discussions of the author in any literature class.</p>

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</p>

<p>There is at least one right here.</p>

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<p>

That is, I suppose, why we distinguish “fundamentalist” from the rest of the Christian community rather than allowing that any given fundamentalist is simply the “Christian.” </p>

<p>However, your sleuthing does reflect a real flair for the obvious.</p>

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<p>

I should think the same would apply if what was at issue was a course on “God” rather than the “Bible” as you suggest there would be on “Dickens” rather than say, “David Copperfield” or “Bleak House”.</p>

<p>In much the same way there may be a course on Shakespeare, the author, rather than “Hamlet,” the play; or Homer, the blind bard, rather than the Iliad, the epic tale; or the tale of “Gilgamesh” rather than the unknown author of “Gilgamesh”…could be a supernatural composition for all we know, but it would not change even a line of text.</p>

<p>As i said, these are, perhaps, just helpless canards in a shoddy effort to avoid the most important work in the literature of Western Civilization because it would be “difficult.” </p>

<p>I suppose we could offer a course on the Mahabharata without having to disprove its divine pedigree, as well.</p>

<p>.</p>

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<p>I don’t think people have studied Shakespeare’s works without at least a rudimentary introduction to the man and his times</p>

<p>Same with Dickens</p>

<p>Or Homer</p>

<p>But maybe some curriculums teach the literature in a vacumm, without connecting it to the times and the author</p>

<p>Take 1984 for instance…the times and the author are relavent to the story</p>

<p>Or The Jungle…or perhaps Utopia</p>

<p>To think that great Literature doesn’t need to pay attention to the author the time and the context is foolish, and to not realize that the text in discussion here is a compilation of many works and to not impart that on the students is doing the students a disservice</p>

<p>To pull a story, ie Cane and Able, or Noah’s Ark, and compare to other text and NOT share the places THOSE stories came from is shoddy teaching and a shoddy curriculum</p>

<p>Teaching for instance Uncle Tom’s Cabin without talking about context, the times, the author’s life would not be teaching about Uncle Tom’s Cabin completely</p>

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<p>I guess I want the highest standards and the deepest curriculum, not just a surface glossing over to satisfy the religious elements who would in some cases prefer deeper searching and research be not done</p>

<p>after all, once some start to see sources etc for many writing, not just the bible, they tend to ask more questions…</p>

<p>I have done that with various editorials that have been shared on this site</p>

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<p>Ignore the man behind the curtain!</p>

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<p>heh…heh</p>