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October 7, 2006
Tools of the Trade
Jim West and Noah Tutak are having an amazing discussion. It concerns the need for what I see as basic scholarly tools. On this issue, I side with Jim. A scholar must have the necessary tools. Perhaps I should have left this as a comment on one of their sites but I think it a little long. But not too long to be read.
At a very minimum, a Biblical Scholar needs to be able to read Classical Hebrew, Aramaic, German and French. Of course, I think some Akkadian, Ugaritic, Phoenician and Egyptian needs to be in the toolbox if one is interested in the cultural background of the Hebrew Bible. I also think you can be a Hebrew Bible scholar with only a smattering of these languages. Knowing a little Arabic and Coptic is a good idea also. One needs to know enough to read and understand the experts in these other areas. I worry that Modern Hebrew has become an indispensable tool.
Who would ever raise the question, "Does a classicist need to be able to read Greek and Latin?" Or French, Italian and German for that matter? Everyone would be surprised if a Confucius scholar didn't read Chinese and several dialects of Chinese at that. How about an Egyptologist who didn't know Egyptian, Coptic, French or German?
Of course, interested readers who lack the scholarly tools can read and enjoy the great literatures of the world in translation but those readers should never be thought of, or think of themselves, as scholars. Such readers can increase their knowledge, understanding and even their enjoyment of these texts by studying secondary literature in their own language. In the end, however, such readers must always defer to those that have the necessary tools. But that is not enough. Many people with the basic tools are not experts in anything but their own hobbyhorses. The less one knows the more one needs to make certain that one is reading real experts and not what Jim West calls dilettantes. Remember, there are many educated dilettantes with quite full toolkits. For example, unless you have a pretty full toolkit yourself, I wouldn't pay too much attention to anything I say about the Hebrew Bible here on Abnormal Interests. I say this even though I have at least some of the required tools (many of which are a little rusty) and do not consider myself a dilettante. But then, dilettantes never do.
I think Noah would find it very strange if I claimed to be a mathematician and a computer scientist but I just hadn't gotten around to learning calculus and the C language.
There is a threshold beyond which a person cannot pass in any discipline without the necessary tools. That threshold is much lower than most people think. In the case of the Biblical scholarship, a dogma of universal individual access to the Bible coupled with a dogma of Biblical infallibility has camouflaged this threshold for many people of faith.
Posted by Duane Smith at October 7, 2006 10:49 AM | Read more on Hebrew Bible |
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Comments
Duane-
Thanks for joining in on the discussion. I have to say that I agree with everything you say in this post. I found your point regarding the "language" of math and computer science especially interesting and appropriate.
I just want to clarify that I am in no way a Biblical Scholar - I am a dilettante at best. I never claimed to be a Biblical Scholar. And I think that is the point - for some reason it was assumed that I was a Biblical Scholar.
If one were to tell me that they enjoyed reading about math and was interested in learning more about the field, I would not tell them that they need to learn the "language" of abstract algebra before I recommend a book to them. Nor would I expect someone pursuing an interest in computer science to learn C++ so I can forward them some source code for their "enlightenment".
I agree completely that someone who is a serious scholar in a field should certainly learn the "language" of that field - I just don't think that is an appropriate prerequisite to force on a "dilettante".
I think in the end we all agree, to a point at least, on the basic concepts. We might, perhaps, disagree on tone and our attitude towards the dissemination of knowledge.
Posted by: Noah at October 7, 2006 5:04 PM
Noah,
As someone who once did send about 50 lines of fix point C code, although not C++ code, to someone who couldn't read it, I understand what you are saying. On the other hand, there was in my communication with that person strong indications that he could indeed understand it. By the way he put the question, I would have sworn that he wanted the see the C code. I don't think that was the case with you and Jim. Jim and I both have a tendency to showoff a little more than is helpful. But it is part of the human condition to misunderstand someone else's capabilities and this invariably leads to error and further misunderstanding. Thanks for your thoughts.
Posted by: Duane at October 7, 2006 6:39 PM
"But it is part of the human condition to misunderstand someone else's capabilities and this invariably leads to error and further misunderstanding." - I would add especially over the internet!
Posted by: Noah at October 7, 2006 10:15 PM
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