Biblical Hebrew Forum

["R. Lehmann" <lehmann AT uni-mainz.de>]

Well said, George!

Maybe then - and only then - I might come back to this list as an *active* participant not wasting my time in reading fancies of self-appointed experts who only try to re-invent the wheel.

Best regards,

Reinhard

Dr. Reinhard G. Lehmann

Akademischer Direktor

Forschungsstelle für Althebräische Sprache und Epigraphik

Fachbereich 01: Evangelisch-Theologische Fakultät

Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz

D-55099 Mainz

Germany

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 1 Aug 2013 00:12:39 +0000
From: George Athas <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ezek 3:26
To: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>, K Randolph
   <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>
Cc: Jerry Shepherd <jshepherd53 AT gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CE1FE1A5.149F9%george.athas AT moore.edu.au>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"

No Karl, Jerry is not a 'perfect medievalist'. The 'ad fontes' ('to the sources') motto of the Reformers did not mean to pass over or ignore all commentators, or to consult them second. On the contrary, if you read the work of the Reformers you will see just how indebted they were to previous commentators, especially the Church Fathers. They studied the sources in conversation with the contributions of others. Jerry is doing exactly what the Reformers were doing. He is engaging in a conversation over the meaning of the sources, acknowledging previous contributions with appropriate credit and critiquing them where he deems it fitting. He refuses to do his scholarship in bleak isolation with the sources only, as though he needs to 'invent the wheel' on his own and then maybe see what other 'wheels' people came up with. He is, rather, doing the wise thing of listening to others before he speaks?a wholly appropriate way of dealing with the sources. It's called scholarship.

I can't see where Jerry has committed a logical fallacy, but I can see where you wilfully choose to sideline the contributions of others in order to trump up your own opinion formed largely in isolation. Rather than misperceive Jerry's approach and clang publicly over it, I suggest your limited time would be better spent going to the commentators in order to glean some of the wisdom that might be on offer. This does not mean surrendering your faculties to them. It just means joining the scholarly conversation. If that's not something you see as valuable, then I question your need to be on this forum, where we are interested in constructive conversation with valued contributions. Perhaps you should do as I have suggested many times to Jim Stinehart, namely move your views to a blog where you can simply air them without having to engage in real conversation.


GEORGE ATHAS
Dean of Research,
Moore Theological College (moore.edu.au)
Sydney, Australia