Odessa's New Bible Curriculum : Dispatches from the Culture Wars

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Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of Michigan Citizens for Science and co-founder of The Panda's Thumb. He has written for such publications as The Bard, Skeptic and Reports of the National Center for Science Education, spoken in front of many organizations and conferences, and appeared on nationally syndicated radio shows and on C-SPAN. Ed is also a Fellow with the Center for Independent Media and the host of Declaring Independence, a one hour weekly political talk show on WPRR in Grand Rapids, Michigan.(static)

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Odessa's New Bible Curriculum

Posted on: June 3, 2008 9:16 AM, by Ed Brayton

Odessa has adopted a new Bible curriculum, as required by the settlement of the recent lawsuit. Unfortunately, there's almost no information out there yet on what is in the curriculum. The school board website has some information, but it doesn't show much. The one sample lesson, about Samson, looks pretty high level for a high school course. I'm told that they took this directly from an upper level undergrad course at Oklahoma State put together by Duke Pesta. I'm going to try and get my hands on the whole thing.

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After reviewing the sample lesson on Samson, I can guarantee that that the fundevangelists will absolutely hate it. The sample lesson plan does an excellent job of placing the Samson myth within the cultural/literary traditions of other Iron age civilizations of that partof the Middle East. Somehow I don't think that bringing in Joseph Campbell's et alia's deconstruction of the hero myth fits into "goddidit exactly how it says in the Bible" school of interpretation.

Posted by: Mark | June 3, 2008 10:09 AM

... wow. The non-frothing reference to Harry Potter in the middle of a biblical discussion was more than a little jarring.

Posted by: Art | June 3, 2008 11:37 AM

That is exactly the kind of course I would enjoy; one that is not afraid to look at every context of the biblical text. But I do think this course will go well above the heads of your average high school student. Heck, I think this class would go above the heads of most college freshmen and sophomores.

Art, I study the Bible-and I have no problems with Harry Potter.

Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 3, 2008 11:46 AM

What everyone else said. This looks like an excellent course, if a bit too advanced for high-schoolers. It is far too sane to be acceptable to the people who generally push Bible courses in K-12. Anyone who took such a course and did the necessary work and thinking might still be some sort of Christian, and that's fine with me, but that student could not possibly become the sort of Christian the fundies want produced.
What are the odds that the course will be taught with anything like academic integrity?

Posted by: CJColucci | June 3, 2008 12:19 PM

Rev. AJB, my apologies, no offense was intended. I know the portion of the population who has problems with Harry Potter is much smaller than that which doesn't, and wasn't suggesting otherwise. It's more that here on these wild Internets I've come to expect running into the loud voice of the minority more.

Posted by: Art | June 3, 2008 12:19 PM

I could teach that course at my SBC church without any complaints (and do: my Sunday School lessons are comparable to this, if a lot less highbrow). It is not that Fundamentalists automatically oppose this type of criticism; they are largely unaware that it exists! Where they would oppose this study is that it is a study of the text as a text, and not an exegesis on the life of Christ.

But they don't mind comparative approaches. All of Western civilization is based upon the Bible, remeber?

Posted by: kehrsam | June 3, 2008 12:37 PM

Wow, God apologizing. It's about time.

Art is God, right? I seem to recall my priest saying, "Our father, who's Art in heaven..."

(100 geek points to anyone who gets the TV reference)

Posted by: Abby Normal | June 3, 2008 12:39 PM

What happens when the fundies find out that the Old Testament is full of sex, drinking, and dancing?

Posted by: Bill Poser | June 3, 2008 1:52 PM

Art-no offense was taken! I've watched all the HP movies with my oldest two boys and enjoyed them.

Abby Normal-I thought his name was "Andy." As in "Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me, Andy tells me I am his own!"

Bill Poser-Amazingly Fred Phelps never seems to quote those parts of the Old Testament in his rants against homosexuality.

kehrsam-I also have taught courses very similar to this in my church. And many of my seminary classes were like that lesson. Actually one of the best Bible courses I took was at IU. The prof was up front that this was a Biblical history class, and that is what we learned, Biblical history.

Posted by: Rev. AJB | June 3, 2008 2:40 PM

I'm told many NYC kids used to be unduly afraid of train travel because they had so often beseeched the Lord to "lead us not into Penn Station." Having been raised Catholic, I was unfamiliar with the prayer warning about that busybody Good Mrs. Murphy, who followed us all the days of our lives.

Posted by: CJColucci | June 3, 2008 6:02 PM

I'm told that they took this directly from an upper level undergrad course at Oklahoma State put together by Duke Pesta. I'm going to try and get my hands on the whole thing.

I'm a grad student at Ok State. I'm in philosophy, not literature, but the religious studies department here is a subdepartment of the philosophy department. When I go into the office tomorrow I could ask some people from there about this and send you an email. I'm sure sure someone at religious studies is familiar with Dr. Pesta's curriculum, or can introduce me to him.

Posted by: Wes | June 3, 2008 7:48 PM

I remember Sunday school lessons along these lines from my freshman year in high school. I thought they were fascinating. Growing up on a progressive seminary campus while my dad was a student there, I couldn't imagine ignoring the history surrounding the Bible or otherwise taking it out of context.

Then my family moved to a more conservative part of the country, where Sunday school amounted pretty much to reading the printed lesson verbatim and shuffling back and forth through the pages of the Bible, looking for the relevant passages. No discussion, much less disagreement, unless I spoke up. I became a thorn in the teachers' side, not because I was ornery but because I couldn't sit still for such a shallow treatment of the scriptures.

(I must confess to getting ornery occasionally out of sheer frustration. I used to carry an interlinear Greek-English New Testament for reference. One Sunday I was called on to read a scripture passage aloud and I read it in Greek, which of course was Greek to everyone else [=badoom-chk!= sorry, couldn't resist =grin=], and told them it didn't say what the writer of the lesson plan wanted us to think it did. Needless to say, it was quite a while before I was asked to read another passage aloud in that class.)

40 years later, I still have culture shock at the kind of regurgitated pablum that's served up in the average Sunday school. When I'm visiting my parents and go to church with them, I almost can't stand to sit in class and listen to people treating the Bible as if it existed in a vacuum (and was written by King James in 1611). It makes my skin crawl.

Posted by: themadlolscientist | June 4, 2008 1:15 PM