tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post40333264502823190..comments2024-02-19T04:50:58.170-08:00Comments on Shuck and Jive: Does Anyone Remember the Enlightenment?John Shuckhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00798753206614838161noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-84281528949227916342008-08-20T07:44:00.001-07:002008-08-20T07:44:00.001-07:00Doug wrote:One thing I respect about the JS is tha...Doug wrote:<BR/><BR/><I>One thing I respect about the JS is that their suppositions are all put out there in front so that it is clear what is going on - and anyone can make up their minds what they think of the project.<BR/><BR/>I wish most Biblical scholarship was anywhere near as honest as that.</I><BR/><BR/>Agreed. That is what I like I about them, too.John Shuckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00798753206614838161noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-74764778690917193022008-08-18T17:42:00.000-07:002008-08-18T17:42:00.000-07:00Re: criticisms of methodology - I just want to not...Re: criticisms of methodology - I just want to note that the Jesus Seminar is not the beginning of critical scholarship. Those involved come into it with suppositions, but they are not arbitrarily chosen due soley to bias (tho bias always plays a role). They come from the lifelong work of critical scholarship to which all of these Jesus Seminar members are committed. <BR/><BR/>Your doctor also comes to the practice of medicine with "presuppositions", like the germ theory of disease, which are the result of hundreds of years of medical research. Just pointing out a supposition isn't anywhere near enough to prove that it is an *unfounded* supposition.<BR/><BR/>Looking for scholarship without any 'presuppositions' is like going in search of the last unicorn. What you have to do is decide which suppositions are justified, and go from there. It isn't as if critics of the JS don't have their own suppositions functioning as well. One thing I respect about the JS is that their suppositions are all put out there in front so that it is clear what is going on - and anyone can make up their minds what they think of the project. <BR/><BR/>I wish most Biblical scholarship was anywhere near as honest as that.Douglas Underhillhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02215736448645573566noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-89796592290012989502008-08-18T06:29:00.000-07:002008-08-18T06:29:00.000-07:00I value the Jesus Seminar, not so much for the acc...I value the Jesus Seminar, not so much for the accuracy on the authenticity of any particular verse, but because of their larger efforts to undeify the Bible. Of course their methods are not perfect, nor are their decisions. The Jesus Seminar is a human project, and hence errors are expected. But to look for small defects as reasons to discard the entire enterprise is to strain at a gnat.David R.https://www.blogger.com/profile/13902714786448599023noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-31944085659528559102008-08-18T05:17:00.000-07:002008-08-18T05:17:00.000-07:00Hedrick wrote about the Jesus Seminar: "We are fau...Hedrick wrote about the Jesus Seminar: "We are faulted not because of our methodology".<BR/><BR/>There actually have been many criticisms of the methodology. One criticism is presupposition. The Jesus Seminar originally came up with rules of evaluation. In these rules, they state conclusions, before any evaluation of the evidence is done. For example:<BR/><BR/>• Words borrowed from the fund of common lore or the Greek scriptures are often put on the lips of Jesus.<BR/><BR/>• The evangelists frequently attribute their own statements to Jesus. <BR/><BR/>As <A HREF="http://www.markdroberts.com/htmfiles/resources/unmaskingthejesus.htm" REL="nofollow">Mark D. Roberts points out</A> that <I>these "rules" were established before the examination of the gospels actually took place. These were meant to be rules that guided inquiry. But in fact they look much more like results of inquiry, not the rules of evidence.</I><BR/><BR/>There are many criticisms of the methodology that anyone who does a quick Internet search can find.Paul Schmidthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06655615436435581707noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-91715480067383530192008-08-17T16:57:00.000-07:002008-08-17T16:57:00.000-07:00Thanks for that quote. I think part of the diffic...Thanks for that quote. I think part of the difficulty for some is realizing that the Jesus Seminar uses secular methods, as Charles Hedrick put it:<BR/><BR/><I>The Jesus Seminar represents a wide variety of religious traditions among the fellows, but we do not observe any theological or confessional boundaries. We study early Christian literature using the same methods as modern secular historians.</I><BR/><BR/>Of course, most people who are interested in Jesus, the Bible, and Christianity come at it from a confessional perspective. <BR/><BR/>The church would be wise, in my view, to appreciate what secular methods can teach us regarding Christian origins.<BR/><BR/>Similarly, secular methods teach us a great deal about cosmology, biology, and sexuality that a purely confessional perspective will miss. <BR/><BR/>If the church is going to be anything but a "sacred grotto" (Hoover) it will have to embrace secular wisdom and conclude that God is revealed in this manner as well as through our religious symbols and practices.John Shuckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00798753206614838161noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30648257.post-6909980287296164392008-08-17T16:00:00.000-07:002008-08-17T16:00:00.000-07:00A lot of misinformation gets spread about the Jesu...A lot of misinformation gets spread about the Jesus Seminar by religious conservatives. It gets falsely accused of somehow preselecting its fellows based on theology and of having a monolithic, biased agenda. It is nothing of the sort.<BR/><BR/>Marcus Borg has this to say about it in his book "Jesus in Contemporary Sholarship":<BR/><BR/><I>Fellows reflected a spectrum of contemporary scholarship. Requirements for membership were not "ideological," but formal: typically a Ph.D. in relevant areas of gospel research. Most were professors in universities, colleges, and seminaries...<BR/><BR/>Fellows also reflected the spectrum of mainline denominations. Though the seminar had no connection to any church body and no records of church membership of Fellows were made (so far as I know), my impression was that there were about equal numbers of Catholics, Protestants, and non-religious. Many were ordained. A few Jewish scholars were involved. Though fundamentalist scholars were welcome, none became members, presumably because their understanding of Scripture as a "divine product" made the activity of the seminar unnecessary and irrelevant (and perhaps even blasphemous.) A few Southern Baptist scholars took part until pressure from within their denominations forced them to withdraw.</I> (p. 162)Mystical Seekerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10828225180668865911noreply@blogger.com