Unbalanced Curricula?

Nijay and I were talking the other day about the different skills that people from evangelical schools bring to the table. Evangelical schools focus on exegesis, but they don’t do as good a job with history of interpretation and pulling things together. In other words, they do good with analysis but not with synthesis.

I finally got around to reading J. Christiaan Beker’s The Triumph of God. (I know I should have read it earlier.) I asked around to the cadre of other NT students and none of us had to read the book (or his larger version Paul the Apostle) in our seminary or undergrad programs. But there should be a point where students take a step back and look at bigger picture issues and read central books like this. [By the way, this book is a great summary of the school of thought John Barclay follows.]

Now that I am doing some teaching in a much different setting, it’s hit me even more. In the UK students receive about 1/3 of the amount of lecturing than in the US. The emphasis here is on giving the big picture and having the student develop personal critical thinking. This is at the undergrad level, but even at seminaries in the states the emphasis is upon downloading lots of facts. For instance, at DTS we had to take some 18 hrs of Bible survey classes. Only one of those classes was solely focused on methodology. The rest were mostly a focus on commentary detail. They could have been so much more helpful and influential had they focused more upon interpretive methodology for the different genres or synthetic studies like Beker’s. And from talking to other people, DTS is not really any different than other evangelical schools.

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Blackhaw Says:

Wednesday, 27 February 2008 at 10:46 pm

Some at DTS argue that evagelicalism has an unhealthy preoccupation with method. But I think you are right on about focusing more on the big picture. I think protestants need to look at how the ‘rule of faith’ was used by the early church. That would help them more than some of the detail classes they often receive.

Jonathan Says:

Friday, 7 March 2008 at 6:50 pm

Hi Ben,

I’m interested in your comment that John Barclay follows the school of thought represented by J C Becker. I have read “Paul the Apostle” (not sure how to use italics) and I am curious whether you simply mean that Dr. Barclay agrees that the “coherent center” of Paul’s gospel is a vision of apocalyptic triumph or rather follows Becker’s larger thesis that a distinction should be made between the coherent center of Paul’s gospel and the “contingent” applications of it (Becker suggests Romans as an example of the former, broadly speaking, and Galatians as an example of the latter).

I have read a couple things by Dr. Barclay, and though I can often detect the influence of Kasemann who I suppose stands behind Becker, I haven’t noticed anything that made me think, “hey, this sounds like Becker.”

I guess I am simply asking for some clarification because Dr. Barclay will be my supervisor for the next three years and I wouldn’t mind having a better sense of, as you put it, the “school he follows”

Thanks

Ben Says:

Friday, 7 March 2008 at 8:48 pm

He’s definitely in the apocalyptic school, a la Beker, Käsemann, Martyn. I hear his debate vs Tom Wright at SBL was recorded, and his ‘archic’ forces argument expresses his big picture view of things.

On the coherent-contingent issue, we haven’t talked as much about that aspect. Since I’ve been doing mostly patristics for the first year, I’m still getting up to speed on some pauline stuff, but it seems to me that that paradigm is accepted by most in some fashion or another–they just see a different coherent centre. But definitely let me know if I’m not getting the angle of your question.

Monday, 10 March 2008 at 1:25 pm

Thanks Ben. Thats helpful. I guess I was just asking whether Dr. Barclay is in the apocalyptic school in general or a follower of Becker’s particular version of it.

I’ve listened to the SBL debate (it was terrific) but I think I’ll return to it with an hear for Barclay’s apocalyptic (archic forces) argument.

Monday, 10 March 2008 at 8:06 pm

I don’t guess I know the ‘school’ well enough to know distinctions between those in the it. I’m sure that will be an area of focus over the next year.