garicker: Unfortunately, most of the scholarship never quite seems to make it to the great mass of Christian believers, many of whom have no idea of how much of what they believe to be true about the biblical narrative is totally unsupported by that scholarship.
That's an absolutely valid criticism. On the whole, I would feel better about Christianity as an institution if the churches were more pro-active in providing material and instruction that disseminated this scholarship to their constituencies.
The understanding of the Bible that exists in academia, especially in the more advanced schools, is a far cry from the understanding of the Bible that exists in the world of the average believer in one of the Christian sects.
To be fair, that's true in any field. And religion is a field that is full of layman. Conversely, many of these laymen also profess that religion is a matter of transcendent concern, so you would think that more of them would be interested in applying themselves more directly to a deeper study of the field. For most Christians, unfortunately, that usually means a deeper immersion in the impressionistic form of "Bible study".
On the whole, Judaism seems to have inspired a more devout scholarly tradition.
That's an absolutely valid criticism. On the whole, I would feel better about Christianity as an institution if the churches were more pro-active in providing material and instruction that disseminated this scholarship to their constituencies.
The understanding of the Bible that exists in academia, especially in the more advanced schools, is a far cry from the understanding of the Bible that exists in the world of the average believer in one of the Christian sects.
To be fair, that's true in any field. And religion is a field that is full of layman. Conversely, many of these laymen also profess that religion is a matter of transcendent concern, so you would think that more of them would be interested in applying themselves more directly to a deeper study of the field. For most Christians, unfortunately, that usually means a deeper immersion in the impressionistic form of "Bible study".
On the whole, Judaism seems to have inspired a more devout scholarly tradition.
