As you did your research, what was your impression of modern biblical scholarship?
As I plunged into modern Bible scholarship, I assumed the skeptics would be right, but I soon discovered that their “late date” theories of gospel creation were flimsy, full of assumptions, and that a dislike of Jesus ran through many of their arrogant and pompous books. The field came across to me as a huge scandal. There were believers and non-believers claiming to be Jesus scholars, and the skeptics, the famous Jesus Seminar, had been throwing out some outrageous nonsense to get the attention of the public. I have never seen sloppier scholarship in any field of study than what I saw in so-called biblical scholarship.
From the Fr Dwight Longenecker First Things interview with novelist Anne Rice.
“I have never seen sloppier scholarship in any field of study than what I saw in so-called biblical scholarship.”
That’s because she hasn’t looked at the field of community studies.
Amen to that. I blogged at Neonostalgia.com/weblog lately on whether the whole field was really a pseudo-discipline. I got rough comments — all from atheists! — but didn’t feel any need to change my view. So much of biblical studies looks dubious. So many assumptions, and so much of it on the basis of studying the bible on the principle that it is untrue. (As if that was a value-neutral position!)