Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Ken Litwak <kdlitwak AT concentric.net>]

Peter_Kirk AT sil.org wrote:
> 
 Would you, any of you, agree that in order to properly
> understand an ancient (or modern) religious text you need to have at
> least a sympathetic understanding of the religion of the writers? The
> same would apply to e.g. ancient Babylonian or Indian scriptures.
> There is of course a difference between a sympathetic understanding
> and a personal faith, but I suspect that it is difficult for all but
> the most dispassionate scholars to show the proper sympathy for a
> religion which is diametrically opposed to our own deeply held
> convictions. I trust that Vince can be one of those dispassionate
> scholars.
snip

   I just had to respond to this because it addresses two points i've
thought long about  I've done some reading in works that are avowedly
"feminist" (whatever that means in a given context) and what I have
taken away was not a greater sensitivity to womanist issues (which
would, I think, be a good thing), but the feeling that scholars like
Athalaya Brenner (who is very up front about her atheism) and CHeryl
Exum, because of a open hostility to what they perceive the text to be
about, are not in fact able, so it seems, of fairly interpreting the
Scriptures of Israel, even at the grammatical level, because, as
postmodernism has helpfully pointed out, you can't do neutral or
objective analysis.  So I've stopped reading anything with their names
on it (or the names of other, male scholars) because I think you have to
able to at least accept the text's perspective while working on it,
whether or not you really accept that view in real life. Likewise, the
scholars who have attributed the whole Tanakh to essentially a Persian
creation done solely for political purposes around 300 BCE I don't read
because I don't think their perspective allows them to read the text in
any way I'd consider valid.  I think you must be able to let the text
have its own say and its own perspective when trying to interpret it.   

   Which leads me a little farther a filed (and I'll probably get in
trouble) but I don't quite understand why these individuals are biblical
scholars.  I for one, given that I do not consider the Hindu
"Scriptures" as containing "truth" in any sense that was of consequence,
would not spend my life studying them and I don't think anyone who read
my work on them would find it useful because I would be going into the
enterprise knowing that whatever these texts say, I don't agree with and
therefore may not actually be able to get a sympathetic grasp of.  Not
speaking for others, but I personally could not get over my outside
judgment of the Hindu "Scriptures" enough to be able to read them from
their own perspective.  So I think it would be inappropriate for me to
be a Hindu scripture scholar.  I can't understand why someone  who
rejects the essential world view of the biblical texts would bother
studying them when there are seemingly so many other ways to contribute
to society.  Now  that I've offended a bunch of people, I apologize, but
I aml ooking for understanding rather than trying to condemn.  I had a
prof in my Ph.D. program say that it is because "that's what their
training is in."  I find that a really weak rationalization.  People
change fields all the time. I want to be clear that I am NOT NOT NOT
calling anyone a hypocrite or attacking their character.  I just don't
get why someone who is not sympathetic to the text's perspective, given
that these are avowedly religious texts, would spend time on them. 
Presumably, if one is an atheist, you don't expect any interpretation of
the text to be valuable because that would require their God to exist,
n'est pas?  And of course, you don't need my permission to study the
Scriptures of Israel :-).


Ken Litwak
Trinity College/Univ. of Bristol
Bristol, England