When
John Steinbeck called his 1952 tale of two families' migration,
angst, and betrayal East of Eden, he had good reason to believe most
readers would recognize the title as a biblical allusion to
humanity's exile from earthly paradise. America then was still an
unabashedly Christian nation and the Bible was still the Good Book.
Today, though, the Bible itself is in exile from many public
schools, as administrators—even those not hostile to biblical
faiths—feel the Good Book is more legal trouble than it's worth.
Though the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that public schools may
teach about the Bible so long as that teaching isn't religious, many
schools, lacking appropriate curricula, have simply steered clear.
That's a problem, according to college and high-school English
teachers who overwhelmingly say that biblical ignorance equals
cultural and historical ignorance.
Enter the Bible Literacy
Project, an eclectic mix of scholars, theologians, and businessmen,
from Os Guiness, a well-regarded Christian conservative, to Rabbi
Marc Gellman of New York's Temple Beth Torah to George Gallup Jr.
The group in 2001 set out to write a Bible textbook that dispels
cultural ignorance while respecting both the law and the
sensibilities of Jews and Christians, who consider some or all of
the Scriptures sacred.
The Bible and Its Influence, released on
Sept. 22, hits the mark. The curriculum, designed for high school,
works its way through the entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation,
introducing each section of Scripture, discussing the text and its
themes, and showing where elements of each section manifest
themselves in the culture. The textbook does not shy away from
religion—which would be like discussing Moby Dick while ignoring
whales—but abides by its promise and the legal statutes that
religious ideas "neither be encouraged nor discouraged."
The
cultural connections include the Bible's influence on language
(giving us words such as "scapegoat," "shibboleth," "Armageddon,"
and expressions such as "my brother's keeper," "house divided,"
"two-edged sword"); music (from Bach to spirituals); art (throughout
the canon of Western painting); literature (from Shakespeare to the
movie Matrix); and history (the biblical allusions in famous
speeches, the American colonists' application of "covenant," the use
of the Bible in the Civil Rights movement).
"Some people read
Genesis as a literal account of the mechanics of creation," says the
unit on the Bible's first chapters. "Still others read it as a poem
about God's relationship with humans. Many read the book as both."
Note that the authors don't put creationists down. All can agree,
the unit goes on, that the passages depict God as transcendent, but
personal, and the universe as ordered and good.
The unit draws out
the important worldview elements of Western thought from the
creation account: the dignity of human beings, the order of nature,
the stewardship of creation, and the importance of human
relationships.
The Genesis unit includes a discussion of Haydn's
"Creation" oratorio; a box showing the biblical allusions in the
Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant wedding services; and examples of
how various artists and poets have treated the themes of creation
and Eden. Words from Genesis include "forbidden fruit," "fire and
brimstone," "mess of pottage," and "antediluvian" (before the
flood).
The curriculum points out where Jews and various Christian
traditions interpret passages differently, but treats each religion
fairly. The unit on the Gospel of John explains that John's opening
words are the source of the Christian belief that Christ is both God
and Man. The unit on the Pastoral Epistles includes both a survey of
ways Christians understand the Atonement and a subunit on the
Reformation.
The textbook follows a liberal arts methodology,
showing the interconnectedness of knowledge across the disciplines.
Abundantly illustrated, it is both appealing and educationally
rigorous. Even secularist critics should admit that the material
taught in this textbook is good to know and that there is no
cultural literacy without Biblical literacy.
Copyright © 2005
WORLD Magazine, October 1, 2005, Vol. 20, No. 38
http://www.worldmag.com/subscriber/displayarticle.cfm?id=11092
