Talk:Biblical Studies (NT)/Brief Introduction to the New Testament

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Objection

"and like any other good story, it has an introduction, a development, and a dramatic conclusion." I really dislike this; I don't think the Bible was written (by God or man) with the intention of holding to writing tropes like introduction/progression/conclusion. The fact that it has multiple (human) authors only intensifies the feeling that such a comparison is inappropriate. Would anyone mind if I deleted this portion? The Jade Knight ^(d'viser) 02:16, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Your point is well taken, Jade Knight. In my opinion, though, the two facts -- the Bible has multiple authors; the Bible has an identifiable plot -- are not necessarily mutually exclusive. I'm not making any claims as to how or why the plot came to be there, or whether it is intentional or just pure coincidence, but one can definitely identify an introduction/development/conclusion sequence in the Bible when taken as a whole. It's also worth noting that the biblical contributors didn't speak/act/write in a vacuum, but they were part of a specific and continuous history and tradition, so that they were building (consciously or unconsciously) on what had gone before. The New Testament, for example, is laced from beginning to end with quotes from, and allusions to, the Hebrew scriptures. --gdm 04:57, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Gmasterman, although we both are sitting in the same boat (I am probably a believer the way you are), I have to support Jade Knight as far as you are not fully respecting Wikiversity's principles. We are not a bible college or Sunday School at Wikiversity. I personally fully agree with your observations. But, scholarly speaking, your text and like any other good story, it has an introduction, a development, and a dramatic conclusion is an assumption - nothing more. Unfortunately, like any other good story shows that you probably didn't make a price in literature. I believe that you have best intentions, though. I would like to encourage you to cut the above sentence out, or begin the sentence with: "Many Christians believe that.." And then add some quotes of evangelical theologians. --Inawe _talk 15:05, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Let me get a bit more into detail concerning the literature thing: Contemporary prose likes to work without plot at times, or better, the plot seems to be that there is no plot. But no serious scholar in the science of literature would call it bad literature, or a low quality story. See: The American Scholar. Anyway, go ahead-- we definitely need a high quality NT intro at Wikiversity. Let us keep in touch. That's the beauty of a good wiki. --Inawe _talk 17:12, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Just as a reminder: Wikiversity:Scholarly_ethics :-) --Inawe _talk 17:19, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I was coming at it more from a literary perspective. (I have an MA in lit.) I'm not making any claims as to the legitimacy of the New Testament, only saying what's there - hence the disclaimer on the contents page. Many lit scholars these days believe that we cannot know for sure what an author's intention was (in lit theory, this is called "intentional fallacy"). Related to this is the idea that once a work is published, it takes on a life of its own, and critics will see things in it which were not consciously put there by the author/s. This doesn't mean that they're not there, however, and people derive all kinds of meaning and symbolism from works which almost certainly were not intended by the author. Does this invalidate their conclusions? That's for you to decide. What cannot be denied is that a complete story exists within the pages of the Bible, even when approached purely as literature. Without getting into too much detail: we begin with the creation of the Earth and the human race; then the descent of humans into a state of spiritual and moral darkness which will ultimately lead to their destruction; then the coming of a Messiah to save them from their fate, but they put him to death; the Messiah, however, has power over death and he comes back to life; he returns at the end of the world for a final judgement which results in misery for the villains and a heavenly reward for the good people. Sound like a good plot for a story? It does to me. I wish I'd written it! --gdm 17:28, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

What school did you focus on? Deconstructionism? At any rate, I still don't think that the (quite subjective) argument that the Bible has a plot is compelling, and I (like Inawe) would prefer to see that comment removed. The Jade Knight ^(d'viser) 18:16, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

In addition to the explanations given here, I created a new section in the introduction itself to put the statement into its proper context. I don't know how I can more clearly demonstrate that the Bible contains a complete story, except to suggest that you read it in order from beginning to end. I have no doubt that you will come away with the sense that you've just read an epic of a story, however disjointed it may seem at times. Clearly, the Bible is much more than just a story, but the fact that it contains a story seems to me to be inescapable. As a former lit student, I've seen "plots" with far less cohesion (InAwe speaks of these). Perhaps the objection is that the word "plot" seems to suggest a single author, or a group of authors in cooperation. However, I make no claims along those lines.

Having said that, there may be some merit in the idea of authors cooperating, inasmuch as they all seem to have written in the belief that they were adding to the unfolding story of God's interaction with his people. They all looked back to a common tradition, and looked forward to an ultimate consummation of God's purposes on Earth, which are "foreshadowed" (to use another literary term) again and again throughout the story, until the consummation actually takes place in the book of Revelation. Ultimately, what makes a story is its unifying elements, and one could write a book on the unifying elements of the constituent parts of the Bible. --gdm 18:43, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

It's a bit unusual to think about applying standard literary conventions to the Bible, but it does seem to make sense when considering the big picture. The Bible is a story, even though it's broken up into 66-70 books. Now, if there is a concern about the neutrality of an article, the POV version can always be created separately as I have been doing with my courses. Geoff Plourde 20:41, 22 April 2010 (UTC)