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chavos · 01-03-2004, 12:35 PM

would hamlet be a good play if it was:

If you uncle kills your father and seduces your mother, you should not kill yourself. You should team up with your best sidekick, send a few men to their death, and talk smack to your lover. She will throw herself in to a river. You may then die gloriously to avenge the wrong committed.

Hamlet is written in an old tongue. It contains cultural biases. You can derive multiple, contradictory meanings from it. It is full of evil that is commited in the name of rightiousness.

But you see why the abridged version doesn't cut it?

in terms of bias, etc...yeah. it is not an objective document. Should it be? A document with a moral point to it is not objective. A good example of this is the declaration of independance. Review it, and try to redact biased statements. Won't have much left at all...you'll have a soul-less document.

The language, again is a challenge. But i dispute that it is a critical flaw. There are quality translations available for common use(chief among them the NRSV and the ASV), and the languages are required study for most trained clergy. Even if you simply pick up greek, which is not that hard, you have access to the entirely of the NT. Even still, for most theological work, the English translations are quite servicable. With both hebrew and greek, we possess enough other source material to accurately determine the meaning of most words. If you wanted to excise the study of dead language documents, you would have to give up pretty much all of western history. Thinking of documents written in Latin, Norse, Old or Middle English alone, we have the basis and history of our entire legal system. I don't think this is a valid standard to judge texts at all. Translation and study of language is simply an added and necessary difficulty.

Multiple meaning texts are similarly valid as sources of moral instruction. They promote active engagement and relationship with the text, and the discovery of different solutions to the same problem. Single meaning texts are unsatisfying to adult readers-single meaning situations rarely occur in life, and such texts do not adequately model the realities of existance. Simple fables or moralistic stories do not challenge the reader to develop critical thinking. They foster simplistic responses and positive responses to authoritarian commands.

The question of evil. Engaging the text, i find this to be the most challenging part of my study. To crib words, one of the most pressing questions Pilate faces during the trial is: "What will i do with this Jesus that they say is the Messiah?"

The text as a whole makes amazing claims...but it doesn't always measure up, and sometimes it simply dazzles with its power and resonance with my soul. So what do i do with this Jesus, this text, this God? I challenge, i question, i doubt, and i keep pressing for more. But in that relationship, i can deal with those problems. It may be a matter of looking for translations, other cultural meanings, and contextualizing with in a pre-modern world. I may have to see it as cultural history and not moral instruction. I may have to disown the part of text altogether. But if the Bible did not have evil in it...i don't know if it would really cover enough of human life to be real to us. We spend a vast amount of our time engaged in evil...and for a record of a faith community to not touch upon it, or to even engage in it in the name of God...i would be surprised. Challenging, complex, polyvalent...that's what it has to be to rich enough to wrestle with and to work out a faith with. Simple, easy and clean...does that sound like life to you?

So i'll treasure the scriptures.

01-03-2004, 12:35 PM	#7 (permalink)
chavos Banned Location: St. Paul, MN	would hamlet be a good play if it was: If you uncle kills your father and seduces your mother, you should not kill yourself. You should team up with your best sidekick, send a few men to their death, and talk smack to your lover. She will throw herself in to a river. You may then die gloriously to avenge the wrong committed. Hamlet is written in an old tongue. It contains cultural biases. You can derive multiple, contradictory meanings from it. It is full of evil that is commited in the name of rightiousness. But you see why the abridged version doesn't cut it? in terms of bias, etc...yeah. it is not an objective document. Should it be? A document with a moral point to it is not objective. A good example of this is the declaration of independance. Review it, and try to redact biased statements. Won't have much left at all...you'll have a soul-less document. The language, again is a challenge. But i dispute that it is a critical flaw. There are quality translations available for common use(chief among them the NRSV and the ASV), and the languages are required study for most trained clergy. Even if you simply pick up greek, which is not that hard, you have access to the entirely of the NT. Even still, for most theological work, the English translations are quite servicable. With both hebrew and greek, we possess enough other source material to accurately determine the meaning of most words. If you wanted to excise the study of dead language documents, you would have to give up pretty much all of western history. Thinking of documents written in Latin, Norse, Old or Middle English alone, we have the basis and history of our entire legal system. I don't think this is a valid standard to judge texts at all. Translation and study of language is simply an added and necessary difficulty. Multiple meaning texts are similarly valid as sources of moral instruction. They promote active engagement and relationship with the text, and the discovery of different solutions to the same problem. Single meaning texts are unsatisfying to adult readers-single meaning situations rarely occur in life, and such texts do not adequately model the realities of existance. Simple fables or moralistic stories do not challenge the reader to develop critical thinking. They foster simplistic responses and positive responses to authoritarian commands. The question of evil. Engaging the text, i find this to be the most challenging part of my study. To crib words, one of the most pressing questions Pilate faces during the trial is: "What will i do with this Jesus that they say is the Messiah?" The text as a whole makes amazing claims...but it doesn't always measure up, and sometimes it simply dazzles with its power and resonance with my soul. So what do i do with this Jesus, this text, this God? I challenge, i question, i doubt, and i keep pressing for more. But in that relationship, i can deal with those problems. It may be a matter of looking for translations, other cultural meanings, and contextualizing with in a pre-modern world. I may have to see it as cultural history and not moral instruction. I may have to disown the part of text altogether. But if the Bible did not have evil in it...i don't know if it would really cover enough of human life to be real to us. We spend a vast amount of our time engaged in evil...and for a record of a faith community to not touch upon it, or to even engage in it in the name of God...i would be surprised. Challenging, complex, polyvalent...that's what it has to be to rich enough to wrestle with and to work out a faith with. Simple, easy and clean...does that sound like life to you? So i'll treasure the scriptures.