Portal talk:Biblical studies

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Biblical Studies: Correct title for this division?

It seems to me based off of the department titles (such as "Christian Formation" and "Ecclesiology and Church History") that this division is more a division of Christianity in general rather than strictly "Biblical Studies." Christian formation tends toward Church History (or historical theology) and Ecclesiology is a branch of systematic theology. Neither are a branch of Biblical Studies. Because of this, I added a couple more theological topics (Missional theology and Eschatology). What does everyone else think? Create a new division for Christian Theology separate from Biblical Studies? Or keep Christian theology as a part of Biblical Studies? Cgsayler 02:39, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I think Christian theology should be kept seperate from Biblical Studies, after all studying the Bible is not the sole preserve of Christians, but also Jews and Muslims as well as those sometimes referred to as "seekers" (an awful term in my opinion). AlistairReece 11:32, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Biblical Studies... hmmm. Are we studying The Bible or a bible? I would think that several points of contention may arise naturally from Biblical Studies that are based from within a belief system such as Christianity, so let's not do that. OK? It is natural that strong believers in The Bible as the Word of God (such as me) would detract from an objective study of the Bible and other ancient texts. CQ 18:27, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I think you need to diffentiate there between The Bible and scripture. Most religions have a set of authoritative writings which are "scripture", but only Judaism and Christianity have "The Bible" is some form. Muslims accept certain books as inspired but they are not regarded as canonical in the same sense as in the Christian and Jewish traditions. AlistairReece 12:37, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that Christian Theology should be kept seperate from Biblical Studies. Biblical Studies is about studying the Bible, a practice that by nature should come before any doctrines are formed. Hence Biblical Studies knows nothing of more Systematic Theologies, such as Eschatology, or Ecclesiology. I propose that we keep the following:

• Hermeneutics,
• Biblical Overview,
• Bible Translation,
• Greek,
• and Biblical Languages,

and move the rest:

• Christian Formation
• Ecclesiology and Church History
• Missional Theology
• Eschatology

just my thoughts, --Opensourcejunkie 01:28, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Departmental Organization

Let me start another topic. I think that Biblical Greek and Biblical Hebrew (Ancient Hebrew) should go together under Biblical Language, and subjects such as Hermeneutics and translation should go under Biblical Theology, while Missional theology, Ecclesiology, Eschatology are simply related to another department. For example, Ecclesiology and Eschatology should go to the department of Christian Systematic Theology, and Missional Theology to Practical Depart or Christian Mission Department if we have that. Further, since this is Biblical Studies Dept. at large, we should have subdivision for Old Testament Studies and New Testament Studies. If then so, we can send Biblical Greek and Biblical Hebrew to each related subdivision (Old and New). There's still a lot need to discuss. Hisfootstep 09:17, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Centers instead of Departments

it was proposed on the Theology Talk Page that the Department of Traditional Christian Theology reorganize their substructure from "departments" to "centers". I wanted to propose that we do the same thing here. This would help clarify the whole departments within departments mess, while still allowing us to retain some organizational structure within the department. What are your thoughts? --Opensourcejunkie 01:34, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The change to centers was made, along with a general revamp of the page. If there are any issues with the revamp, let me know; you can find a discussion of the changes on the revision's talk page.

Prayer Requests

I've added a page for prayer requests as a subpage of this one, and linked to it from the main page.

Why? Forgive my being blunt, but this a place for study not prayer. AlistairReece 09:24, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

There is certainly no reason to preclude prayer—when it comes to religion, prayer may be considered a very important element of certain kinds of study. The Jade Knight 16:35, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Biblical Studies (Academic ?)

I think that consideration must be given to the development of another "center" or "section" that takes a more academic approach to the study of the sciptures, in my particular interest at this point, the New Testament. Having a Biblical Studies that is explicitly based on the "literal normative" point of view automatically restricts the information that can be shared and developed. Since there is a basic assumption that the scriptures are inerrant it becomes impossible to discuss topics like the ending of Mark 16:9-20 for which there is very strong evidence that it was added by a later scribe.

Though I would not want to construct another entire "branch" of this part of the department it is clear to me that my interest in studying the New Testament cannot in honesty go forward under the current conditions since I am sure that many of my questions and inquiries would be offensive to "literal-normative" students and teachers.

So the question is what to do. I have come to this point before, about a year ago, when I decided that I would just ignore the whole issue and search for another place to study. Now I have worked my way back here and would like to participate in the development of a more inclusive resource that could accept many viewpoints and traditions.

--Bill A 19:52, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Moving forward in 2011

From the posts on this page and the time stamps in other parts of the Biblical Studies material it seems clear to me that the work was begun in 2007/2008 and has not been picked up again in two years. I personally feel that the main problem is the stated "interpretation focus", this "literal normative" stuff that seems to cut off discussion.

I think the department needs to be revitalized OR a new division created, something like "Academic Biblical Studies" to allow for a more diverse approach to the scriptures.

While we are at it, there should be a consideration of what we want to do here. We already have a fairly "rich" source of Biblical material in Wikipedia itself with many articles on many aspects of the Bible. Added to that are numerous sites on the internet that are highly professional and again very rich in resources. I think we need to think through some way of holding "online seminars" or perhaps "investigations" that use those exisiting resources and provide a place here to discuss, think, consider and interact with the scriptures and all those resources. We don't need what amounts to a "correspondence course" format for our courses.

Anyway, I hope we can get something going. I am not at all qualified to be the person who either leads such an approach nor even adds much to the content at this stage. I do have a Masters Degree in Education which provides me with a skill set that would be useful in designing more active, more interactive, hopefully though provoking learning material. However I have absolutely NO training in Biblical Studies, that is why I am here at wikiversity, hoping to find an alternative study process to spending something like $500- $1000 per course on University continuing studies courses which seem to be the only other viable option.

Hopefully someone will join me in this conversation. --Bill A 04:01, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

January 13, 2011 Anyone Interested? So I have been waiting to see if any of the "contributors" to the initial work in Biblical Studies are still responding to approaches. At this point it seems to be very quiet. I am about to start a study/semimar session on the Synoptic Gospels that is decidedly NOT "literal normative" in approach, but will first try to make direct contact with the noted contributors of this section. --Bill A 14:50, 13 January 2011 (UTC)