Warm thanks to Jim West who cites my biblical studies carnival from July 2009 as “quite excellent and remarkably clever” in his article on the history of biblioblogging (the citation is on p. 5) in the most recent Bulletin for the Study of Religion – which hosts a number of articles discussing the phenomenon known as “biblioblogging” (Jim and James mention the issue). I’m honored to have garnished a footnote in the history of biblioblogging.

Unfortunately (and ironically?), the issue is not available for free online (it is available if you subscribe to the BSR). Neither of my academic institutions for which I have library privileges, UCLA and Fuller, have electronic access. No fault of the Bulletin, I’m sure. Just the nature of things. But I did find a print copy at Fuller. If I had a few more moments of time, I might actually try to engage the very thought-provoking essays in the issue. Perhaps in the not too distant future.

If you can find a copy, take a gander!

I am pleased to announce that my article for my denomination‘s magazine, In Part, has been published. My little article is entitled, “The good (and bad) news about niche Bibles.” The entire issue, with a focus on the Bible (“In Pursuit of the Bible“), is fantastic. The main featured article is “What’s hermeneutics got to do with it?” by Bruxy Cavey (one of the stars of the Brethren in Christ church) followed up by a transcribed panel discussion by BIC pastors and others on the “role of Scripture in their everyday lives.” You can grab the whole issue as a PDF. I have made my two pages available as a separate PDF.

I enjoyed working with In Part’s wonderful editor, Kristine Frey, who recruited me for the piece. It’s fun to write for a wider audience that deeply cares about these issues.

That is, from online sources like blogs, RateMyProfessors.com, and Facebook? Here’s an article of interest in the NY Times: “The Professor as Open Book” by Stephanie Rosenbloom. Here’s the beginning bit:

It is not necessary for a student studying multivariable calculus, medieval literature or Roman archaeology to know that the professor behind the podium shoots pool, has donned a bunny costume or can’t get enough of Chaka Khan.

Yet professors of all ranks and disciplines are revealing such information on public, national platforms: blogs, Web pages, social networking sites, even campus television.

When scholars were recently given the chance to refute student criticism posted on the Web site RateMyProfessors.com, a cult-hit television series, “Professors Strike Back,” was born. The show, which has professors responding on camera to undergraduate gripes such as “boring beyond belief,” made its debut in October on mtvU, a 24-hour network broadcast to more than 7.5 million students on American college campuses.

“It’s our dominant show driving half of the traffic to mtvU now,” said Stephen Friedman, general manager of the network. “It gets more than our music premieres.”

Though it includes a few dissenting views, the article is overwhelmingly positive about professors sharing their lives online as a humanizing networking approach. Being one who blogs and is on Facebook, I think I’d say it’s a positive phenomenon. As long as no naked photos or the like are revealed, I think online chumminess goes a long way towards making connections in the classroom (connections that could lead to further learning!).

A little while ago, I came across an interesting article by a new Fuller professor in New Testament, David Downs. Downs came to us from his PhD program at Princeton Theological Seminary, where he wrote the article, “‘Early Catholicism’ and Apocalypticism in the Pastoral Epistles” (Catholic Biblical Quarterly 67, no. 4 [October 2005]: 641-661). For my class on the history of NT scholarship, I have to write a paper surveying a particular topic in the history of scholarship and I’m thinking about something within apocalypticism. Seems like Downs’ article is a good starting place.

What was the deal with apocalypticism in the early church? Where did the “apocalyptic mindset” of the early Jews and the early followers of Jesus come from? One theory posits that the early Christians (if we can call them that) increasingly set aside their radical apocalyptic fervor as the church developed more structure. It’s a bit like ABC’s Lost. Some people desperately want to get off the island, to get rescued, and will try anything (build a raft, make a huge S.O.S. sign) to accomplish that. Other passengers from Oceanic Flight 815 are more “realistic” about their chances for rescue and decide to set down roots and get comfortable (build a church, set up a kitchen on the beach).

Apocalypticism, the idea that there is a coming cosmic transition and an accompanying judgment of people by God, was common amidst early Jewish texts into the first century C.E., when the early followers of Jesus picked it up. “Early catholicism” (from the German Frühkatholizismus) refers to a growing inclination towards hierarchical church structure, distance between clergy and laity, establishment of a biblical canon, emphasis on sacraments, and a diminished apocalyptic expectation of the immediate return of Christ (the parousia). Some scholars think that traces of such “early catholicism” in the church can be found within the New Testament, particularly the Pastoral Epistles (those being 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus).

At this point, David Downs would like to question a few established assumptions:

To what extent do these letters exhibit the primary feature of early catholicism, namely, a diminished apocalyptic worldview? Or, in short, are “early catholicism” and “apocalypticism” mutually exclusive categories? Is the dawn of the former necessarily tied to the eclipse of the latter? (644)

In other words, is it really such a simple transition from heightened apocalyptic anticipation to a more settled, structured ecclesiology? And is “transition” even the correct word? Can we truly characterize these two emphases as moving along a progressive continuum from one to the other?

First, Downs points out that “[o]ne could hardly imagine a religious group in the ancient (or modern) world simultaneously more apocalyptic and more highly structured than the Dead Sea sect” (648). In the Jews represented by the Dead Sea Scrolls, one finds both structure and fervor. Apocalypticism is seen in various places:

The ideas that the Qumran sect appears to have shared with—or, more likely, inherited from—the apocalypses include: (1) the belief that divine mysteries have been revealed to members of the community (1QH 9:21); (2) the perception of communion with the heavenly world, particularly angelic figures (1QM 7:5-6; lQSa 2:3-9; 1QH 11:20-23); (3) an affinity for the periodization of history (CD 2:9-10; 4Q552-553); (4) a strong dualism, possibly influenced by the Enochic tradition (1QS 3-4; 1QM); and (5) an eschatology shaped by the conviction that the last days have begun but are not yet completed (CD 4:4; lQSa; lQpHab 7:1-14; 4Q174). [649]

Hierarchy is seen, for example, in the Community Rule (e.g., 1QS 5:20-23, 6:2-3). Downs uses the Qumran community to show that “apocalypticism and institutionalism are not mutually exclusive categories” (651). Therefore, we should not see “church order” in and of itself as an indicator for diminished apocalyptic fervor.

On the other hand, Downs mentions earlier Dibelius and Conzelmann’s Hermeneia commentary on the Pastoral Epistles in which they conclude that the letters have an “ethic of good citizenship” in their attempt to fit into the Greco-Roman culture. 1 Timothy 2:1-4 is a classic demonstration of this:

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

The idea here (at least as the author writes it) is to be good citizen, so that your countercultural behavior might not hinder the spread of the gospel. We certainly don’t see such a desire in the Dead Sea Scrolls. I wonder if an increasing acceptance of Hellenistic culture and desire to be good Roman citizens can be an indicator of diminished apocalypticism, even if institutionalization cannot. If a group embraces their surrounding society and culture, what reason do they have for desiring the world to end?

And before getting into Downs’ assessment of the letters themselves, I’ll leave it there for the day.

Wonderful article in The Chronicle, an excellent personal reflection from a professor with working class background. Here’s an excerpt:

I know that I don’t belong in the old neighborhood either. I made my choices long ago; or perhaps others made them for me. No one is awaiting my return. I think I can hear what they’d say: “You seem to like playing the working-class hero for rich people. Whatever. Do it if it works for you. You never belonged here anyway, even when you were a kid. If I could get out of here, I would. So get on with your life. We’ll be fine without you.”

Meanwhile, back on the job as a tenured professor — certifying the inherited status of his middle-class students — the self-proclaimed “academic class traitor” romanticizes his alienation and mocks his own naïve posturing. He realizes there are no people whom he can serve without some inner conflict.

Breaking news from The Onion:

WASHINGTON, DC—According to a groundbreaking new study by the Department of Labor, working—the physical act of engaging in a productive job-related activity—may greatly increase the amount of work accomplished during the workday, especially when compared with the more common practices of wasting time and not working.

I imagine this could easily be applied to academic work as well as the business world.

Yesterday, Inside Higher Ed published two “opposing” articles: one from a skeptic of academic blogging (though this skeptic is an academic blogger) and one from an enthusiast of academic blogging. The former is written by Adam Kostko, a doctoral student at Chicago Theological Seminary, and the latter by Scott Eric Kaufman (see his blog), a doctoral candidate in English at UC-Irvine. The former actually seems to me to be more a skepticism about group academic blogging, especially when those group blogs have a particular shared “mission,” than academic blogging in general. He says that he hopes academic blogs might work to “[bring] new scholarly research to the attention of an interdisciplinary audience.” But at this point in the academic blogging game, Kostko concludes, “academic blogs seem to me to be best-suited as a social outlet for academics who would otherwise feel isolated, creating camaraderie and supplementing the social aspects of disciplinary conferences.”

I don’t know. I think that there is a lot of non-academic “clutter” in biblioblogs, which makes it difficult to keep up with, but I’d say there are two to four good, deep academic multi-blog discussions per month in the biblioblogosphere (not to mention many solid individual posts that don’t pick up multi-blog discussions). That’s pretty good!

And on Kostko’s other point, blogs as a social outlet for academics . . . what’s so bad about that? That is one of Kaufman’s main points when he says, “I consider the power of blogs to be supplementary and concrete: they provide atomized intellectuals a way to meet and remain in contact with fellow sufferers and their ideas.” Let us suffer together!

Inside Higher Ed today reports on a study that while many students drop in their attendance to religious services, very few actually say that religion is less important to them or disassociate with their religion.

The more you pursue a higher education, the more likely you are to abandon your faith — at least that’s what conventional wisdom holds.

“Actually we’ve just been wrong about this for quite a while,” said Mark D. Regnerus, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and one of the authors of a new study that suggests students who attend and graduate from college are more likely than others to hold on to their faith.

It’s not that colleges necessarily encourage faith, he said, but for all the talk about how intellectuals are out to destroy students’ relationships to their religions and God, the main obstacles to such relationships have to do with maturing and how young people spend their time. “Some kids were bound to lose [their faith] anyway and they do,” Regnerus said. But the evidence suggests that college isn’t responsible.

[ . . . ]

Regnerus said that what the study suggests — and his personal experience confirms — is that while there are plenty of non-religious professors around, they aren’t trying to discourage any students from practicing their faith. “Of course there are some who are hostile to religion. But they don’t teach that. They teach their discipline,” Regnerus said. The attitude, he added, is: “Whatever I think about evangelicals, when I go to teach quantum physics, I teach quantum physics.”

One hopes that conservative pastors and communities of faith around the country will hear the good news, rejoice, and stop discouraging their flock regarding higher education! Alas, I suspect it is not the end for the niche of books (or articles) written for Christian graduating high school seniors on how to keep the faith while going off to a godless college campus. One interesting title I just saw on Amazon is University of Destruction: Your Game Plan for Spiritual Victory on Campus by David Wheaton. What is one trying to conquer at the University of Destruction? The book’s description reads in part, “Relating his own experiences at Stanford, David Wheaton describes the three Pillars of Peril you will face in college–sex, drugs/alcohol, and humanism–and presents a game plan for victory over these pitfalls based on raising your spiritual GPA.” One Amazon reviewer says: “You know that a book is solid when both Sean Hannity and Dr. John MacArthur recommend it.” Indeed.

One of the interesting things here is the tension between the Christian fundamentalism of the past (though, I know this study is for “religions” and not just Christianity) and the fundamentalism that has been developing for a few decades now. Traditional fundamentalism is separated from society, but with the help of Jerry Falwell and others, fundamentalism has learned to try to engage culture. To engage culture, it helps to have a quality education. To get a quality education, one must triumph over the liberal, secular propagandist professors bent on demolishing faith (because we all know that the perils of humanism are right up there with sex, drugs, and alcohol). Well, if this study is of any use, it appears that the battle is not so dire, at least not in the classroom. The article does report, however, that behavior has a part to play:

Behavioral factors, he said, are a better way than college status to predict whether young adults will become less religious. Those who don’t have sex before marriage are also those who don’t experience as much of a drop in religious connection. Those who have smoked pot experience more of a drop. Those who increase alcohol consumption during their young adulthood experience more of a drop in religious connection.

Those who blame college for declining religious activity by students don’t understand that it is these factors, among others, that are the influence, Regnerus said. “This is about this period of the life course where freedom and choice become paramount,” he said. “What diminishes religiosity is freedom and choice, not intellectual engagement.”

I suppose that bit about having premarital sex, smoking pot, and consuming alcohol may trigger the aforementioned books and articles. On the other hand, these things seem to be simply indicators, “symptoms,” if you will. A Christian who believes that consuming alcohol is sinful will not lose their faith after consuming alcohol, but if they drink, they are probably already questioning their faith and that has led them to consume alcohol (perhaps in rebellion).

Christian young adults, and I imagine this is true for other religions, need to know why something is “perilous.” Losing your faith should not be the only reason that something is perilous. Perhaps one steers clear of alcohol (either excessive drinking or drinking all together) because one has seen the effects of alcoholism in his or her family. College is the perfect opportunity to question the reasons for positions on morality, and for students to wonder whether their faith “makes sense” to them. That is scary, I suppose, for religious parents, but young adults either need to figure it out for themselves or, I think, they will toss it aside.

Posted today on Inside Higher Ed, is an interesting article entitled “Don’t Be Afraid of Committees.” It is written by Adam Kotsko (see his blog here), a doctoral student in philosophy at Chicago Theological Seminary. He surmises that, far from a waste of time, serving on various committees can become an integral part of the educational formation of aspiring academics, helping them to learn the nuts and bolts of academia. Personally, I can’t imagine being involved on committees while in my M.Div. and trying to make the grades and doing other things that are of the utmost importance to doctoral applications (not to mention M.Div. extras like my part-time pastoral internship this past year and a full-time internship with the non-profit Bread for the World this Summer — which I’m very excited about, by the way). Perhaps it is naive, but I do imagine letting my guard down a little bit once I’m a doctoral student, leaving open more time for learning experiences on committees and whatnot. I would be interested to know if search committees appreciate seeing committee work on the CV when hiring new doctoral grads. Here are a couple clips from the article:

My service on Academic Council also made me eligible to serve on the search committee for an open faculty position in New Testament. That same year, I began a two-year term as the seminary’s student liaison to the American Academy of Religion, which required submitting various reports and — of course — serving on a committee at the national meeting, which that year largely served as an opportunity for us to ask a high-ranking administrator in the academy questions about the organization and its future.

[ . . . ]

All of this was very valuable experience, and although it sounds like a lot of work, it really wasn’t. Much of the actual decision-making, for both the faculty and the board, took place in the closed executive sessions. Thus the responsibilities of students, and so also the expectations of outside preparation work, were limited: Our primary role was to allow student voices to be involved in the conversation. Even at the peak of my involvement, I was averaging under two hours a week, and most of the time it was considerably less. Since I was in my coursework stage, I was normally on campus anyway on the days when the committees met.

Here’s an interesting story of an associate professor of philosophy who got tired of his job and decided to take a two year leave of absence to join the Peace Corps, teaching English in China. I read these articles in The Chronicle of Higher Education written by people having trouble with their academic jobs and sometimes I have to take time to reflect on whether it is what I really want to do. I feel that this one doesn’t apply for me because, well, in the first place I would hate to teach philosophy too, especially at a school that doesn’t have a philosophy major. But he says:

Because, in truth, I have never been very comfortable with teaching. A natural introvert, I am much more at home in the library than in the lecture hall and find the classroom more exhausting than rewarding.

I do lean slightly towards the introvert side, but usually only with new people and then usually only in foreign environments. I do get energized when I speak in front of groups, large or small. Teaching college students is something that I anticipate with great excitement. I can’t wait to interact with and mentor college students when it comes to the difficult issues surrounding their relationship with the biblical text. In a post entitled “The Make-up of a College Prof,” Scot McKnight talks about what makes a good college professor, as opposed to a seminary professor:

I once said the difference between seminary teaching and college teaching was that in seminary we teach our subject but in college we teach students. I don’t think this says it all, and I do think it can mask a false dichotomy, but it was my experience. Sometimes I think it wouldn’t matter one bit what I was asked to teach at the college level, because I’d have to figure out where the students where and who they were and then just get into the mix with a subject and start moving onward.

I long to be on the other end of this educational journey and be able to be experience what McKnight describes here. I guess what I’m saying is that while I find this philosophy professor’s predicament interesting, I’m not sure I can imagine myself going through the same crisis 20 years down the road. I guess we shall see!