This page contains links and extracts to the debate at SBL in the 2010 era where a good presentation was made by Kenneth Atkinson, Department of Philosophy and Religion, University of Northern Iowa in January 2012 discussing the two enterprises. The letter (post) resignation from Ronald Hendel and a response from SBL that led to Atkinson’s paper are further down this page.
In a response by Hendel in a comments section to and SBL post here (see Comment 89) he used the phrase “humanities-oriented critical biblical scholarship and confession-oriented scholarship” that is another way of positing the title to this post; IMHO.
Atkinson’s paper—The Historical-Critical Historical/Theological Enterprise: Why Are We Asking These Questions?—was presented in January 2012 after a special session at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature titled “The Bible as Sacred and as Secular Literature.” The paper is very insightful and provides much insight into a critical historical approach vs. a theological approach. Extracts are cited below as four bullets.
- The academic study of religion operates upon the premise that those who adhere to fixed religious presuppositions or fear a critical examination of the biblical text cannot fully engage in critical biblical scholarship. To overcome the dictates and presuppositions of religious approaches, modern biblical scholarship has adopted a criterion for scholarly inquiry into the Bible known as historical criticism.
- Troeltsh argued that the first basis of historical criticism is the principle of criticism itself. Any conclusion is subject to revision: inquiry can never attain absolute certainty but only relative degrees of probability. Troeltsh stated that this method of reading texts brings a measure of uncertainty to every single fact: it disconnects religious faith and all particular facts. Troeltsch wrote of its implications: “Give the historical method an inch and it will take a mile. From a strictly orthodox standpoint, therefore, it seems to bear a certain similarity to the devil.”13 Troeltsch emphasized that the scholar of religion must study scripture in a strictly historical fashion and not allow Christian tradition—and one may add Jewish tradition as well—to provide the framework for studying scripture.
- Troeltsch describes his second principle of the historical-critical enterprise as follows: “Analogous occurrences that we observe both without and within ourselves furnish us with the key to historical criticism.”16 Basically, Troeltsch here argues that historical knowledge is only possible because all events are similar in principle: we must assume that the laws of nature in biblical times were the same as now.
- Since Scripture is the product of communal decision, we must be willing to examine and question the decision of those who canonized Scripture. To quote R. G. Collingwood: “so far from relying on an authority other than himself, to whose statements his thought must conform, the historian is his own authority.”23 As long as scholars are willing to examine the very content of Scripture and entertain the prospect that the decisions of those who collected our present canons were wrong, then they are practicing the historical-critical as opposed to theological enterprise akin to any other academic society.
Biblical Views: Farewell to SBL – Faith and Reason in Biblical Studies by Ronald S. Hendel. Two paragraphs are extracted below in italics.
So instead of distinguished academic organizations like ASOR and AAR in the fold, we now have fundamentalist groups like the Society of Pentecostal Studies and the Adventist Society for Religious Studies as our intimate partners. These groups now hold SBL sessions at the annual meeting. The participation of these and other groups presumably boosts attendance—and SBL’s income—to previous levels. What’s wrong with bringing in such groups? Well, some of them proselytize at the SBL meetings.
So critical inquiry—that is to say, reason—has been deliberately deleted as a criterion for the SBL. The views of creationists, snake-handlers and faith-healers now count among the kinds of Biblical scholarship that the society seeks to foster.
Below the BAR post here there is a link to Hendel’s statement and the response emailed to members by SBL Executive Director John F. Kutsko on August 12, 2010.
Another appealing phrase – Humanities-oriented critical biblical scholarship and/or confession-oriented scholarship
