Loading...In this thread I’ve been talking about how I go about writing a trade book, and I am now dealing with the question of how an author chooses what to write about. I was indicating earlier that some of my graduate students have a difficult time knowing what to focus on in their dissertations. Most of my students come up with amazingly good ideas; but every now and then I have a student who simply can’t decide what to do. It’s hard because the dissertation is their first book, it has to be academically rigorous, on a topic of some intellectual importance, and dealing with it in a way that has never been done before. The same is true with all works of serious scholarship.
Having said that, I should point out that the New Testament itself is the most heavily researched book (or set of books) in the history of civilization. And lots of areas of New Testament scholarship are thoroughly “over-researched.” That makes it hard for students and even senior scholars sometimes to know what to write on, since so much of the field is so thoroughly overworked already. I think on the blog a couple of years ago I mentioned that I had been at my annual professional meeting and met three different scholar-friends from three different academic institutions who all told me they were writing a commentary on the book of Philippians. Like we need more commentaries on Philippians? (We have a *lot* already – some of them very good. It’s very rare that someone can say something new in a verse-by-verse exposition; so each of these scholars were trying to package old information in new ways for pastors, mainly, who wanted a commentary to help them know what to preach about on Sunday morning….) I consider this kind of enterprise – commentaries for pastors – to be a kind of scholarship, but it’s not really hard-hitting, ground-breaking, knowledge-producing, field-changing scholarship. It’s at a much lower level. (There are other kinds of commentaries that really are hard-core scholarship, however; those in the Anchor Bible and the Hermeneia series are real-deal-scholarship, for example; but most commentaries are not at that scholarly level).
My point is that there is scholarship for scholars to promote scholarship. That’s the kind of scholarship I try to do. There’s another kind of scholarship…
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Larry Hurtado said:
“Ehrman, who has now achieved what I’m told was his aim of becoming a celebrity-scholar, has done so essentially by writing popular-level books that comfort and reassure sceptics, and annoy or even infuriate a lot of those Christians with little exposure to scholarship and a “pre-critical” understanding of Christianity and the Bible […] Bart’s done some recognized and respected scholarly work too, but, clearly, it’s saying naughty things that antagonize fundamentalists, such as he says he was once, that gets you a literary agent and media attention.”
http://larryhurtado.wordpress.com/2012/04/20/the-ehrman-blog-site/
I find this offensive, wrong (in its assertions and inuendos), and completely ungenerous.
Do you think Larry Hurtado has any understanding that he and the majority of Christian scholars write to comfort and reassure believers while annoying or even infuriating critical scholars who recognize apologetics when they see it? The majority of critical scholars have a very definite line they draw in the sand in their critical scholarship. It glares like a neon light when discussing the nature of God, the nature of Jesus, miracles and resurrection. There are many Christian critical scholars who can not distinguish between mythology and history and I suspect this is why your next project is on the oral tradition which is drawing much Christian critical scholarship most of which is base on false presuppositions.
I think Larry is a very even-handed and serious in his scholarshop — I don’t consider his work to be particularly apologetic (unlike lots of other evangelicals) (I’m not sure if he identifies as an evangelical or not; if he does, I would assume that he’d be to the left of that spectrum). Is there a book or part of a book of his that you’re thinking about in particular?
You are correct. Larry is very even-handed and serious in his scholarship but the question with all Christian scholars (and I suspect Larry Hurtado is on the left of the spectrum) is judgement. The same Christian upbringing, life and views that leads Larry to believe (as he’s been told) that your aim is to be a celebrity-scholar with a literary agent and media attention is what informs his decisions on how to analyse the evidence of early Christian devotion to Jesus, what is relevant, how to interpret it and what is and isn’t convincing. His Christian worldview does not allow him to view you objectively.
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Almost by definition Christian writings are apologetics because most Christians have some view of a personal God, Jesus as a manifestation of his love, lean toward the possibility of miracles (arguing that they can’t be disproved) and have an interpretation of resurrection to give it meaning even if not arguing for a bodily resurrection. Their books inevitably reflect this. How evidence is reviewed and analyzed reflects this. Their judgements on what is probably or unlikely reflect this. Christian scholars in most cases could write the conclusions of their books before doing the research because their Christian lives and worldviews will lead them to some variation of traditional beliefs.
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Christian scholars and much NT research make the classic mistake of believing the first story they are told which is that of the narrative gospels and Acts. This is the story they were brought up on and many still hear at church every week. Despite the continuum of beliefs at every point, the overall framework still revolves around Jesus, disciples who followed him but fled at his crucifixion, the visions of his resurrection and exaltation, the triumphant return to Jerusalem, the scattering of the Hellenists and of course Paul’s gentile mission.
Interesting. What I’d say is that if Christians are necessarily apologists because they’re Christian, then everyone must be an apologist for his or her perspective because they hold that perspective. That may be true enough!
The most intrusive (effective?) denominations (among the 41,000 Christian denominations) tend to be
promoting absolutism (inerrant Bible, strict interpretation), while the “comfortable” mainstream Churches (Rick Warren, Joel O’Steen) see the scriptures as an ancient pre-echo of Poor Richard’s Almanac.
Does this topic interest you? After all, the historian scholar probably doesn’t exist in an intellectual vacuum. There is a practical effect (on the ultimate consumer of evidence, the religious devotee’).
Is there a book lurking in this tension between Fundamentalists and Secular/Agnostic scholarship?
The famous Scopes Monkey Trial continues to play out in the tug-of-war between “Intelligent” Design and Science in public schools. Do you feel any kind of obligation to dip a toe into those roiling waters with a Trade book based on, say, the top 10 most contested historical inaccuracies promoted as “true” by Evangelicals?
I pretty much stick to my expertise — the NT and the history of early Christianity.