Church and state! Church and state!
By Jeff Emanuel Posted in Culture | Education | Featured Stories | History | The Bible — Comments (49) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
...or, "Using another primary source in the teaching of history."
Last week, Georgia’s Board of Education, by unanimous vote, preliminarily approved two new literature and culture classes for use in public schools beginning next year. Pending a 30-day comment period, the board is expected to give these courses final, official approval.
The difference between these new courses and others – and the reason why there will be controversy surrounding them – is that they involve the Bible.
Entitled “Literature and History of the Old Testament Era” and “Literature and History of the New Testament Era,” the classes involve the reading of the Bible as literature, not as a religious text, and are intended to provide cultural, historical, and literary education and context (not religious indoctrination) through the use of a text which contains ample amounts of all.
Read on . . .
As Georgia's state Senate Majority Leader Tommie Williams (R), the program’s legislative sponsor, said, the Bible “plays a major role in history,” and “is important in understanding many classic literary works.”
"It’s not just 'The Good Book,'" Williams has been quoted as saying. "It’s a good book."
While this development will cause the usual suspects to claim government establishment of religion, and violation of the mythic “separation of church and state,” the fact is that using the Bible as a literary and cultural reference is, in actuality, neither.
As an historian, I see this from a different point of view. As I look at it, the Bible can serve as a history and a literature text every bit as effectively as it can a religious one and, despite statements to the contrary, there should no more problem with offering non-religious classes on the Old and New Testament eras (which involve the study of the Bible as a primary source) than there is with offering classes on ancient Greece, Rome, or any other civilization or culture. The Iliad and Odyssey, for example, are studied in public schools for literary and cultural edification, yet there is no outcry from those who oppose government-sponsored religion that such instruction is a governmental endorsement of Zeus or of Apollo. Likewise, the Aeneid is read and studied without interference from those who see it as an attempt to impose the Roman pantheon on poor public school students.
Sure, those are old examples; who, you might ask, would possibly consider worshipping Jupiter, Juno, or Minerva these days, anyway? These works, though, were as serious an example of religious and moral texts in their day as the books of the Old and New Testaments have been in theirs. A simple once-over of the Iliad will expose the reader to far more instances of divine intervention in human affairs than occur in the New Testament.
Similarly, diverse texts of ancient civil and religious law – such as the Roman Twelve Tables, or the Babylonian Code of Hammurabi – are acceptable for study. Will the simple fact of greater modern relevance prevent the Bible, which presents the laws of the Hebrews (in the form of the Ten Commandments, among others), and the later laws of Christianity, from being read as the historical documents and mores that they are?
On the other end of the spectrum, there will be those who oppose these additions to school curricula for the explicit reason that they do remove religious teaching from the study of the Bible. Lost in the protest against a non-religious study of this text, though, is the consideration of the invaluable historical, cultural, and literary knowledge and context which can be gained from such education. Such knowledge and context can be used, by those who so choose, to achieve a better understanding of their own personal Judaic and/or Christian faith than a simple Sunday once-over of religious topics addressed by the Bible can hope to accomplish.
The events of the Old and New Testament eras are an integral part of the history of Western and Near Eastern civilization – and, by extension, of our own culture. Outlawing the study of certain parts of history, and of their particular beliefs, movements, and cultures, out of fear of accidentally promoting religion, would be akin to sacrificing education and erudition on the altar of political correctness – and political correctness is a poor reason for the breeding of ignorance in our children.
Several groups and individuals claim to oppose this new curriculum because of the lack of clearly-defined boundaries with regard to what the teachers of these classes may (and, more specifically, may not) say. Ironically, many of these also protest the Intellectual Diversity in Higher Education Act – for the precise reason that they see it as a threat by governmet to establish boundaries with regard to what teachers may and may not say. There is apparently only room for such restrictions when the teaching of a Bible literature class is the subject of the regulation.
Regardless of the obvious sensibility of this addition to Georgia’s public school curriculum, there will be protests from both sides of the aisle. In response to this, there are two options: we could kowtow to political correctness on one hand, and to fundamentalists on the other, and prevent the Bible from ever being used in a public educational setting – or we could be sensible, recognize that the Bible has as much place in the contextual study of cultural and literary history as does any other primary source which is currently being used, and allow it to be used as such.
If the course was on the Quran everyone would be complaining. My only concern is what will happen if some smart alec gets in the class and starts being critical of the Bible. Are student going to be 'allowed' to question the material?
Those are important considerations before they move forward.
Are student going to be 'allowed' to question the material?
Eh? It's taught as history, culture, and literature. I fail to see where you're going with your question.
So you mean, questioning that it's the Word of God? I don't see how that's an issue here, as it is supposed to be being taught as a primary historical source, rather than as a religious text.
but had to steer clear of any discussions of truth or relevancy. I'm just concerned how their treating that.
...smarter than a fire hydrant. Just building from the ground up so that we are on the same page.
It's a side effect of being an academic ;-)
found in the Koran, and it was a course provided I think at the middle school level and involved various lessons where students pretended to be muslim etc.
I think people did sue over this one and they lost.
Personally, I think the Koran is useful to study in a historical/cultural sense.
I think we are way too over reactive to issues religious, and I think it does our children a disservice to pretend like religion doesn't exist or have a historical/cultural context outside of the religious belief.
My daughter learned all about the Mayan and Incan cultures in her 5th grade social studies class last year. She learned all about their religious beliefs, the various gods that were worshipped, and how those fit within their culture. I don't think that was the establishment of religion anymore than learning Greek mythology, the Greek gods and reading the Odyssey established any kind of religion.
I'd consider the outrage over the teaching of the Quran as literature equally.
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
I think it would make a very good high school level type course. I remember reading Biblical passages from the Old Testament in my college literature class (Genesis, some Psalms and I think Ecclesiastes something like that). I don't think anyone who was already religious left the class feeling less religious or anyone that wasn't religious leaving the class more religious. It was actually kind of interesting.
In the end these are courses that are offered as a electives, if you don't like them, then sign up for something else.
Especially if teachers not educated to teach history are expect/allowed to teach these courses. Besides, we need emphasis on math and science at the high school level. I could be snard and suggest that we consider math and science of the new and old testament as an alternative.
courses, I would expect that the teacher either be familiar with history or familiar with literature, and I would hope that anyone who got a degree in either to teach secondary education would have had at least some exposure to both. Shoot my degrees are in criminal justice and I had at least 15 credits that involved history/lit/humanities.
These courses are also electives, they aren't required for graduation.
And I don't understand why you think offering these courses makes it impossible to offer math and/or science courses. They aren't mutually exclusive and I find it doubtful that the math or science teacher would be the one teaching the course, as you already mentioned you would only want history teachers teaching it, or are you wanting the history teacher to take on math and science courses?
and it requires someone skillful to introduce the information in a thoughtful manner. Having a well defined curricula helps, but I sensitive material needs to be taught by someone with experience and background. Without question, whoever teaches these courses will be under a lot of scrutiny, especially in the first offerings of the class.
The course being an elective is not relevant to me in terms of who is qualified to teach the class.
would have had any history past the 200 level, which would have been about the Eighth Grade level a generation or two ago. Most have the minimum required courses and the rest of their credits are in pedagogy. Many states have changed that in recent years requiring an undergraduate subject matter degree with the pedagogy largely being taught postgraduate, but it will be a long time before that works its way into the system. Even so, one should not have any illusions about how well educated a recent college graduate is.
In Vino Veritas
There is a problem in using it as a text in the same manner advocated for the Bible here, because it is organized by length of Sura, rather than chronologically. Many of the passages contradict others, and the interpretations are often hotly debated as to which is correct, which supercedes which, and what a passage actually means, since it is by definition taken out of context. Islamic scholars use other sources (e.g. Haditha) to come to their interpretations as to what the context of a given passage SHOULD be. You may have noticed that a lot of Muslims spend time killing other Muslims because of the differences in these interpretations.
Politics is a key element in all this, as Islam is a theocratic religion in which fundamental control of the state and ecomnomics are as important as spiritual considerations. Militancy is advocated as a primary means to get and maintain that control, and how much (if any) militancy should be employed is yet another aspect of Islam subject to interpretation.
That means, in essence, that if you are going to use the Qur'an as a primary source historical and cultural text, virtually everything in it is without context until interpreted by a scholar. Where that scholar stands politically carries a LOT of weight.
I would be extremely surprised to find the interpretations being taught as historical and cultural text in our schools today focusing much at all on the militant aspects of Islam. Yet strictly as an historical text, that would be the primary focus. If not teaching religious principles, you are left with what Mohammed and his clan did in their lives, and an awful lot of it was about making war, collecting tribute, and being completely merciless to those who didn't submit.
The problem is, of course, that if you don't teach the militant aspects, you lead students to very different considerations of what threat (if any) Islam poses than what they are likely to encounter in the real world. Lambs to the slaughter as it were.
So what does this all mean as relates to the topic under discussion? Just this. Any religious text is going to have unintended political influence at the least, and that influence may well be intended. We don't get educated, well-rounded citizens who are capable of discerning truth from fiction and using good critical thinking processes though censorship. It should all be taught, and fully explored.
Ethics and morality are critical components of our form of government, and when we refuse to use pertinant documents to see where we actually came from, rather than where some pundit with an agenda decides to say we came from... we are chosing ignorance and gullability over reality.
there are many internal contradictions and there have been many bloody disputes throughout history over which interpretation is most important.
I took a Biblical History and Literature that was required by the religiously affiliated liberal arts school that I attended. It was very difficult for some people who value the text as the Word of God to think critically about it. For example, when we covered aspects such as disputed authorship and some of the politics involved in choosing which texts were canonical.
The fact is, many of the things that a majority of Christians assume about the Bible and about the origins of the Christian faith are not historically accurate. That does not mean that Christianity is invalid, but I wonder if it is possible to cover such difficult and sensitive material in a high school setting. I am more worried that devout Christian students would be offended by having their mythology questioned than that atheists would be offended by reading certain sections as poetry (which it indisputably is)
with teaching the bible in public schools as a literary/historical document. my only concern is that high school history/literature classes focus too much on old, irrelevant eras.
i'm not saying kids shouldn't know their old/new testament-era history. i'm just saying that when i went to high school, not that long ago, we focused so much on the damn etruscans and the "cradle of civilization" that i heard more about the tigris and the euphrates than i did about the civil war. we never even got past world war II, gandhi was never mentioned *once*, the vietnam war warranted a week, and we never discussed a president after lyndon johnson.
i'm less worried about the religious content involved in teaching courses using the bible than i am about the bias toward ancient history.
again, i'm not saying ancient history is not relevant, just that it shouldn't be taught at the expense of modern history, if there is such a thing.
first post! :)
I think the problem with finding the most 'current' history is that someone has to write the text, have it vetted, published, peer-reviewed, and recommended for inclusion in a curriculum for it to get out there. Given that teachers and administrators were probably not exposed to it in college for exactly that reason, there is a tendency (at least in lower education) to cut it off at a well-understood point in time.
I had no trouble finding extremely current 'history'(detailed Viet Nam war, The formation of the French Fifth government, Glasnost and Perestroika, Reagan at Rekjavik, the Falklands War) at the college level. But of course, the body of available works even at the college level is limited and will increase with time.
Much of what you get in Poly Sci courses references recent political events as well.
still, i wish we could find a way to expose high school students to recent history. part of the reason i was so apathetic about politics and current events is that it all seems like a hopeless morass of facts and opinions until someone encourages you to wade in and begin to understand what's going on.
history.
That said I understand your frustration, and I think part of the problem is as much that teachers usually end up not managing their time and curriculum well, so that they just end up running out of days to teach with too much to cover, so they ended up rushing through the majority of the 20th century.
This course would be an elective history type course, and it doesn't appear that it would be taught in a general US or World history class-it would actually seem more like a course that coule/should earn either a lit or social science credit.
If the teachers focus on analyzing the poetry, composition, and all that scholarly stuff in the Bible or any other book, religious or not, i have no problem with it, but if teachers start adding their religious views into it, legal problems will arise.
Stop the ALCU .org is and will be watching the ACLU.
...that there aren't strict enough guidelines on what teachers can't say (while they complain that government is trying to make strict guidelines on what teachers can't say in other cases).
I have no doubt that, even if it is carried out in a way that you say is OK, then the ACLU will still have a problem with it, simply because it is the Bible. As I said above, a greater level of modern relevance is a poor reason to shun a primary source (and I suppose, as the resident scholar of ancient history, I understand the extremely important connotation and importance of the term "primary source" in a way that may not be translating as effectively as it should - my fault for not emphasizing and explaining correctly), and thus to leave chunks out of a person's education.
This is a slight restatement of what I said in the piece, in an attempt to better convey the essence - and importance - of Primary Sources.
The events of the Old and New Testament eras are an integral part of the history of Western and Near Eastern civilization – and, by extension, of our own culture. Furthermore, as a primary source, the Bible offers invaluable information and insight into the culture of its time. Primary sources are the Holy Grail, if you will, of historical scholarship – for, rather than depending on interpretation after interpretation, taken farther out of temporal, spatial, and cultural context, primary sources are the words of the people of the time, and whether it be Herodotos, Suetonius, or the Apostle Paul, a primary source’s words carry a weight, and an authenticity, which cannot be matched by later interpretations or summaries. Outlawing the study, via primary sources, of certain parts of history, and of their particular beliefs, movements, and cultures, out of fear of accidentally promoting religion, would be akin to sacrificing education and erudition on the altar of political correctness – and political correctness is a poor reason for the breeding of ignorance in our children.
Does that help a bit? I'm trying here :-)
does not endorse the Greco-Roman pantheon of soap opera gods and neither does teaching the literary merits of the Judeo-Christian bible. It would be especially helpful if Strong's concordance is used in the course.
I doubt if the Georgia BOE and the counties have enough backbone to arrive at and hold a firm standard for the course against the objections of families from particular denominations but, if they can, it would have tremendous educational benefit regardless of what anyone decides to believe later in life. One should know what a particular book says before one knows to endorse or oppose it.
Aren't some of these same "church and state" people also in favor of introducing Qu'ranic studies?
teaching the Bible doesn't endorse Judeo-Christian beliefs any more than teaching classical mythology endorses polytheism.
Sometimes I hit "post" when I'm aiming for "preview."
When I took European History in a public high school, I remember learning a great deal about the Protestant Reformation. This was handled by a teacher who really knew the history, and it was handled in a way that was effective, interesting, and fair. Only the most obtuse could have seen what was going on in that class as violating any possible reading of the non-establishment clause. If you are going to teach European history, literature, or philosophy, you are inevitably led to discussions of religion.
The problem is many history teachers are idiots. Their knowledge of history may not extend much beyond the textbook. I have no doubt they can screw this up in a major way. I guess it will all come down to how well the football team is doing that year.
all that detailed, or at the least I don't remember it provoking any discussions about religion in general. I do think the instruction on the reformation and enlightenment being much better in college courses, so to some extent this experience may have been as much due to teaching and curriculum as anything else.
Honestly I remember very little instruction in high school leading to discussions of religion-I don't even recall a debate on abortion in a social science class invoking religion or religious belief.
And honestly, at the high school level-especially if you are looking at the junior/senior level, I really can't see where a discussion of religion, if it is moderated and student led (ie students discussing and giving opinion not the teacher giving opinion) would be a bad thing.
There is no question that it is possible to design a worthwhile course around the Bible. That said, I have little doubt that in some (many?) school districts the schools (or individual teachers) will use the course to proselytize.
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
Someone mentioned that the Quran is full of contradictions -- I haven't read it, unfortunately, but the Jewish Bible (and its Christian superset) also contains contradictions aplenty. This is no place to expound on those contradictions, but just to give an example we have Genesis 1 and Genesis 2, which offer conflicting accounts of the Judeo-Christian creation myth.
While it makes good sense to include the Bible in literature classes, and my AP Lit class in 12th grade certainly had a unit on the Bible, it doesn't seem like a course covering only the Bible should be taught at the high school level except as an elective for those who are genuinely interested. Studying the Bible as literature is a very interesting thing to do, and one day I really do plan on reading the whole thing. But then we have problems.
We know well of the many inconsistencies in the Bible. The Torah in particular had four different authors at least, with differing styles and conflicting versions of the same story. Genesis is pretty good, and Exodus is pretty good, but there is no literary merit in the remaining three books, and I pity the poor high schooler who is made to read about the census of the Israelites. Furthermore, for all we know, the Torah could be entirely fictional, not in the sense of exaggerated but in the sense of totally made up in order to give the Jewish people a national identity. The same goes for the Prophets. Archaeological evidence seems (according to Israel Finkelstein, who has his dissenters) to indicate that there was no united monarchy and that the whole history as in Prophets was embellished and/or invented to make the Jews look better than the much more militarily and economically successful Israelites. The Old Testament should not be understood as fact by anyone for whom the truth is important. I haven't read the New Testament, but I'm sure it's similarly starved of fact.
So WHY should the Bible be taught as literature when it's not even good literature? It's certainly important literature, and it's an important artifact of world religion, since it's literature that many people even today actually think is true. It shouldn't be taught as history for the obvious reason that we can't trust its accuracy. I'd say it's Eurocentric and the like, but that's irrelevant, I think.
We just can't have people who actually believe what they read in this book teaching out of it to high school students who may not have any intention of such a belief. When we read the Iliad, we know that the events are fictional, that there was no gigantic humanoid Zeus sitting on a many-fountained Mount Ida, and there was no almost invincible warrior whose armor was made by a lame metalsmith humanoid whose incredibly beautiful wife cheats on him with the gigantic humanoid of war. When some people read the Bible, they actually read it as the word of a god and as the undeniable truth. I encourage critical thinking of any book, of course, and as an atheist, I specifically encourage critical thinking about a book that claims to be from a deity, but this type of critical thinking is bound to be done badly by your average high school student -- or even your average gifted, AP-taking high school student -- and by a high school teacher. A course on the Bible should be taught at the college level by a qualified professor who will be sensitive to his or her students' superstitions regarding the book in question and who, for the sake of academic integrity rather than a controversial interpretation of the First Amendment, will not allow his or her own superstitions to unduly weigh on his or her students.
Seeing as it all takes place in the Middle East and involves what were native peoples thats quite a stretch. The new testament is much the same except for the Romans and Few Greeks.
We just can't have people who actually believe what they read in this book teaching out of it to high school students who may not have any intention of such a belief.
Got that old critical thinking thing going. I suppose you would have prevented Schliemann from teaching history because he believed in the myth of Troy.
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
get in the way of good rant
"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition." -- Rudyard Kipling
Weren't they in the mid east though ? I could swear Antioch is in the Mid East
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
Looked it up, its the same way the Visigoths wound up in spain.
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
Shows how diffuse the Celts were in their day. Sort of like the Vikings, who made it from Newfoundland in the West to the Volga in the East.
Galicia, in the northwest corner of Spain, Galicia in central Europe, and Galatia in central Anatolia. All were named after the Celtic Gauls who settled there. Romans often invited barbarians in and give them land in exchange for military service, assuming that civilization and the opportunities of advancing in Roman society would take the edge off of them.
Kind of like our modern, "Mexicans do work that Americans don't want to do"
that Mexicans are barbarian hordes or that they are going to overthrow our democracy. Actually maybe I shouldnt have even mad that analogy, since the only way to flesh it out would be to make it into a threadjack. It is interesting though how so many of our current debates are like echoes from antiquity.
some of these contradictions are perceived according to how they are taught and interpreted, and that will be the thorniest issue of any Bible literature course. This is why I hope they'll use responsible materials, particularly the Strong's concordance, and try to get into linguistic and translation matters. I won't guess a fraction but there are millions of Christians, Jews and Muslims who are taught their respective scriptures very badly.
Other than being a violation of a misinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution, what is wrong with letting each State decide which religion(s) it will favor in the schools it provides? What they teach and how they teach it should be left to their legislatures, or to their people. And as long as parents can without penalty remove their kids from offending religious classes, and other religious beliefs can still be promoted by private means within the State, then let the State of Georgia create whatever religious class it wants. Let the majority rule! And if someone doesn't want the revenue of your State to be spent accordingly, then he can actively promote and vote for the contrary in the political arena, and if he still isn’t satisfied, then let him vote with his feet. And until someone is denied any of the above individual rights, I fail to see how any religious program promoted by a State rises to the level of being tyranny by the majority.
Advancing the status of unborn human beings one or more persons at a time.
the wrong is in states providing schools. The majority should not rule. The individual should.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
International Editor of
What happens to our community when we all go our separate ways?
Advancing the status of unborn human beings one or more persons at a time.
I have nothing against communities. It is governments that generally mess things up. Please note, the two words are not synonymous.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
International Editor of
you don't often worry about split ends. Sorry. Please erase the word "community" above from your mind, and insert the word "government" in its place. Does that help you understand me? It is not as pretty, but it still says what I intended even if the two words are not completely synonymous.
Advancing the status of unborn human beings one or more persons at a time.
It just won't be butting into things which are none of its concern - like education.
As a result, your community will be stronger.
No hair care products in my household either!
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
International Editor of
is too seldom used in high school.... at least it was at the high school I attended, and I went to a very good high school that generally had much higher scholastic standards than you typically see today.
However, I agree with you that primary source material is clearly the most valuable in teaching history and culture. Texts are often biased, and worse than that, are often these days chosen by various B.O.E.s specifically for their bias.
I stuck with mostly the same history professor throughout college, precisely because researching primary sources was a major part of the way she structured her classes. You didn't study a topic without reading literature published at the time of the event, to include not just historical background, buy items that conveyed the prevailing culture and general political atmosphere as well. She was a phenominal teacher, and (just as an aside), one of the few conservative voices I encountered in college..... just coincidence that she relied so much on primary source and was conservative I'm sure :7)
Ideally in the type of class you describe, the Bible would be used as a compact reference library, adjunt-to other course material, rather than as the centerpiece of the course. If the course is about history and culture, and the Bible is just used as a primary source reference (as could other books like the Qur' an once the relevant period of history was arrived-at), I don't see how even the ACLU can object. If they do, they'll likely be wasting their money. I doubt even the 9th Circuit would find against using the Bible in that manner.
The willingness of some to censor what others are allowed to hear and learn is an anathema to the republic.
______________________________
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777