[concerning people who criticize the Bible and its texts]
Do these persons deserves our attention? Should they be recognized as authorities? No, they deserve calculated contempt for their efforts. (By this, I do not mean emotional or behavioral contempt, but a calculated disregard for their work from an academic perspective.) They have not even come close to deserving our attention, and should feed only itching ears with similar tastes. Skeptics with largo egos who complain that this site does not always link to the articles it is addressing need to be told that their efforts -- engaging what I will call from here on "trailer park scholarship" -- do not deserve links.
36 comments
I hate to break it to you, but no one gets to be recognized as a Biblical scholar by reading popular books and having no conception of the broader fields. Those scholars have to study the early texts, the language and the social milieu of the time in way more depth than any fundie preacher ever did.
"Their scholarship, as a whole, is reckless and pitiable; what they know, they have learned from reading a few popular books with no conception of the broader issues and fields at hand."
You do need to have a link and sources because, man, an academic work needs references to be checked, just in case you're not being accurate or inventing the whole stuff. The one who should learn about academic job is YOU.
Do these numbskulls really think that anyone is going to find their assertions more believable when they openly refuse to cite even the arguments they are claiming to oppose?
Fundy: "proof? I got all the proof in the world right here and whatta you got? Nothing that's what! Me on the otherhand I got proof up the yingyang. Open the dictionary to the word 'proof' and there's a picture of me with the caption 'Proof: he has it."
I guess if I were capable of losing a debate to an undercooked lima bean I'd be pretty defensive, too.
Wait, what?"Their scholarship, as a whole, is reckless and pitiable; what they know, they have learned from reading a few popular books with no conception of the broader issues and fields at hand."
That'd be kind of like... reading a website without bothering to read the articles it is addressing, now, wouldn't it?
I love the way all those quotes have been taken so much out of context. Perhaps it would be more honest to quote the parts where he explains why he thinks these people don't deserve links etc? Understanding ancient documents like the biblical texts properly requires taking into account scholarship from a number of different fields. Literature, social sciences, Greek and Hebrew scholarship, textual criticism to name a few. Most of the skeptics you meet online don't do any research besides googling Bible problems. At least interact with the reasons someone has said what they have instead of moaning about a few quotes which have been divorced from their context.
"These people deserve not links, but contempt and obscurity."
In the end, with uneducated goofs like this guy, it always comes down to censorship and a call to hate and dismis the opposition. They have no way to win a logical, fact-based argument about even their own Bible.
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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